D&D 5E With Respect to the Door and Expectations....The REAL Reason 5e Can't Unite the Base

[Underman]

@D'karr if I understood your two options, that doesn't reinforce the larger point as it applies to my game. The third option to maintain immersion is: my PC does not choose to throw himself off the cliff. I accknowledge I have the option to use falling damage rules for 100' cliffs, but I find it ridiculous, and I choose not to use it.

 

[D'karr]

@D'karr if I understood your two options, that doesn't reinforce the larger point as it applies to my game. The third option to maintain immersion is: my PC does not choose to throw himself off the cliff. I accknowledge I have the option to use falling damage rules for 100' cliffs, but I find it ridiculous, and I choose not to use it.

Sure that's a perfectly usable option too. I never said that anyone was supposed to be limited in options.

So if in your game a particular "rule" is not to your taste then don't use it. I've done that with every single game since I started playing, including every version of DnD too. You can also modify the "rules" to conform to your tastes, much higher damage, etc., which is also something I've done will all editions of DnD.

If on the other hand I postulated that 4e doesn't allow me to do that, then I'd be lying to myself.

 

[Emerikol]

I am still curious about your answer to my question that I've raised several times now.

When your PC has only 3 out of 73 hit points left, and the enemies are armed with longswords (d8 damage before any adds to the dice), you - the player - know that any hit is likely to be fatal. How does your PC know this? How does your PC know that, after all those previous hits, most of which were scratches (including scratches inflicted by longswords) but a few of which weren't, the next hit will not be a mere scratch?

As my hit points go down, I am finding it harder and harder to prevent a serious attack from getting through. Do you doubt as you take more wounds, grow more tired, etc... that you don't realize this? That last attack you blocked was real close. The next one might get through. The blood I've lost already has slowed me down. It's a number that IS an abstraction. But it IS about something real. That is the distinction your missing. You confuse abstraction with dissociation.

I think the reason your onto this example is because in the past hit points were dissociative for you. The way you thought of them etc... But for those of us with issues with dissociative mechanics we didn't think about them in the same way. That is the beauty of a good abstraction. You can go either way. It's why you keep thinking old editions had dissociative mechanics because you used them that way. Many of us did not.

There are realism issues here I agree. Some of us would rather be a bit less realistic (and hey it's not like either of us are hyper realistic anyway) and less dissociative. You likely tried to make hit points more realistic by surrounding them with dissociative mechanical explanations. Thats fine for you because we can each do our own thing. With the daily martial power, we can't escape the dissociation.

 

[D'karr]

I think the reason your onto this example is because in the past hit points were dissociative for you. The way you thought of them etc... But for those of us with issues with dissociative mechanics we didn't think about them in the same way. That is the beauty of a good abstraction. You can go either way. It's why you keep thinking old editions had dissociative mechanics because you used them that way. Many of us did not.

Couldn't that exact same justification be made for what you choose to call "disassociative" now?

"Those of us that have no issue with them don't think about them in the same way." You're absolutely right that is the beauty of abstraction. You can go with it either way. That is why you keep thinking new editions have disassociative mechanics, because you use them that way. Many of us do not.

If I choose to do so with one set of rules, then I should not then go and blame the rules when I choose NOT to do so with the other.

 

[Balesir]

Whew! I'm away for a day and this thread moves on so far that it seems superfluous for me to respond to several of the responses to my last post - so I won't. If anyone really wants me to clarify something specific, please feel free to ask.

Reading the thread as "catch up", I do have one speculation I'd like to test:

For those wanting "simulative" or "associated" mechanics, can you say if this is more or less what you want/mean: rules that give not only effects or outcomes, but also cause-and-effect explanations of how and why those outcomes arise that satisfy you, with the implied assumption that, if those cause-and-effect explanations don't apply to a use of the rule, then the rule is taken not to apply?

As my hit points go down, I am finding it harder and harder to prevent a serious attack from getting through. Do you doubt as you take more wounds, grow more tired, etc... that you don't realize this? That last attack you blocked was real close. The next one might get through. The blood I've lost already has slowed me down. It's a number that IS an abstraction. But it IS about something real. That is the distinction your missing. You confuse abstraction with dissociation.

I think you have missed what is "dissociative" about hit points. The "knowing that I'm tired and battered and likely to fail soon in defence" is not the problem - that fact that I am apparently feeling this way and yet quite as able as ever to run, jump, climb, swim, shoot a bow or cast a spell, however, seems suspiciously similar to being "too tired to use an encounter power" and yet quite able to do all those same things.

 

[Underman]

So if in your game a particular "rule" is not to your taste then don't use it. I've done that with every single game since I started playing, including every version of DnD too. You can also modify the "rules" to conform to your tastes, much higher damage, etc., which is also something I've done will all editions of DnD.

Theoretically, what if you wanted to modify a rule as the DM. Player 1 agrees. Players 2 and 3 don't want you to do it. So say the RAW stays as is. Now players 1's sense of immersion is ruined with the mechanics in place.

Or players 1 and 2 want a rule ignored. Player 3 doesn't want to ignore it. The RAW stays as is. Now players 1 and 2's sense of immersion are ruined with the mechanics in place.

In that theoretical case, would you personally blame:
1) one player or another for ruining immersion for the others
2) the "losing" players for not sucking it up and finding a way to maintain immersion
3) the mechanics (that were ultimately not houseruled/ignored) for inducing lack of immersion for one player or another?

Did the underlying rules, all of a sudden, change to make one more palatable than the other? No.

Unless I'm misextrapolating the context, then the answer can be: Yes! x people judged CaGI as unpalatable and it got nerfed to make it palatable.

The immersion is ruined not because of the effects of the power, not because of the mechanics, not because of the description from the paladin character's player, but because of your "I'd be as correct as he" attitude.

With original CaGI, x people didn't like the process narrative being used by others and thought "I'd be as correct as he that CaGI is ridiculous in D&D".

Therefore, is it analagous for you that: the immersion is ruined not because of the effects of the power, not because of the mechanics, not because of the description from the players using original CaGI, but because of x people's "I'd be as correct as he" attitude.

IOW, do you blame some number of 4E players for getting CaGI nerfed?

If yes, well, I would not. I would rather blame the original CaGI as being sufficiently unpalatable, rather then blame the players for some sort of imaginative deficiency, at least for humanist reasons if nothing else.

If no, then it seems to follow that you don't have to blame Nagol's attitude either for the lack of immersion.

I hope I articulated that properly.

 

[Mallus]

Getting back to this after a (mostly) Internet-free weekend...

The reason the mechanic is disassociated is its use has no bearing on character action or frankly, choice.

The power works regardless of taunt (un)used or (in)action taken by the character.

What makes you say that?

The description of CaGI states, roughly, "You call enemies over and give them the beating of a lifetime".

It doesn't, for example, say "You do nothing..." or "You stand stock-still...".

Your argument is contingent on the player choosing to use CaGI and then declaring their character chooses to do nothing (or something else) -- like the player of an AD&D M-U deciding to cast fireball, then saying their PC doesn't wave their arms about, chant munbo-jumbo, and hurl bat guano, ie they choose to deliberately disconnect the player and character choices/action.

Why would a player choose to do this? This is what puzzles me about this whole line of argumentation. Help me understand this. I've always thought reconciling mechanics to fiction is simply an ongoing part of all RPG play.

What CaGI doesn't do is explain precisely why or how the taunt/challenge works, but neither does 3e explain how a rogue can evade a fireball while not moving from the 5' square they're standing in.

It also seems to me this approach could be used to demonstrate any ability or mechanic is dissociated. Here, I'll dissociate 3e's Power Attack: the player decides their PC will attack using full Power Attack -- but their character decides to make a tentative swing to test their foes defense.

Viola, dissociation! I mean, if you're going to posit a 4e player who chooses to use a power and then fail to reflect that choice in the fiction, what stops you from doing to 3e-style mechanics?

A player can decide to try and add colour to the power use -- but that does not associate the power with character choice.

Serious question: then what does?

What connects a player's choice with their character's choice -- if not the player's declaration that they are connected?

 

[Mallus]

Because the whole point of a process sim is that it is supposed to map directly to the fiction in a manner that stands up to the outcomes. If a process sim falls apart when you try scrutinising it it fails as a process sim.

The word 'simulation' takes an awful beating in discussions like this, doesn't it?

Can you imagine the discussion of the relative merits of other kinds of simulations, say a simulation of the weather, where the results were declared irrelevant?

"Well, my model predicts the temperature in New York will average 215 degrees in January, and hurricanes for Oklahoma, but I still think it's valuable."

Or a simulation of American football, say a video game, where a tackle can send a player through the air the length of the entire field, and scores are routinely in the hundreds.

It's simulation for simulation's sake. Immersion in algorithms.

 

[Neonchameleon]

OMG, here we go again. Enough. I said I agree that I have a 'feeling of dissociation' which was very clearly expressed to pemerton and upthread. See post 802 2nd last paragraph. Get over your beef with me and move on please. I get irritated, become irritable, other people get irritated.. so stop it. Harrass somebody else who has the patience for it.

On this occasion you are right, and my apologies. I'd not checked carefully to make sure you'd differentiated yourself from the opening salvo of the edition war that the origional essay on disassociated mechanics represents, or Emerikol and the previous users of the term on this thread.

 

[Crazy Jerome]

It also seems to me this approach could be used to demonstrate any ability or mechanic is dissociated. Here, I'll dissociate 3e's Power Attack: the player decides their PC will attack using full Power Attack -- but their character decides to make a tentative swing to test their foes defense.

Yep, and we are once again back to the start of the circle, where it becomes clear that the essay "disassociation" is "the player is unwilling or unable to associate the mechanic, with something acceptable to them or the rest of the table, to the fiction." Which is about the person, not the mechanic--or possibly about the relationship of person and mechanic, not the mechanic itself.

Note the "unwilling or unable". If a particular player has one conception of how something works, while the DM has an incompatible conception, and this doesn't get resolved somehow, then the player may be unable to associate the mechanic to the fiction. That doesn't mean incapable of ever doing so, but right this moment, the conditions make it impossible for this person. "Unwilling" is more along the lines of, "I could rationalize X working this way, but .... Gaaahhh, I will not!"

This also explains why hit points are generally acceptable but various new 4E things are not. Anyone familiar with the history knows full well that hit points (especially in the increasing by level D&D version), have not been acceptable to many people at times--have been immersion breaking and other points that are called "disassociated" in these discussions. These people move onto other games ... or come to terms with hit points. They were once unwilling or unable to accept them, but something changed.

Finally, that also explains why presentation is so important on these things. It's easier to sort of "accept conditionally" a mechanic with a gloss you like, and then with familiarity it may grow on you enough that even seeing beyond the patina you still like it well enough. Or the gloss gets you over the unwilling part long enough to find you do like parts of it. A coating on the pill makes it go down more easily, without choking.

And in point of fact, "disassociated" is the very last term that a thinking person aware of the psychological state of "disassociation" would use to describe the above. Roughly (not technically precise), when a person is psychologically disassociated, they are suffering from an inability to reconcile thoughts and/or beliefs with emotions--often strong emotions caused by trauma. That is, associations are there, but they are often factually incorrect and/or beliefs damaging to the person--such as, "I'm a terrible person because someone keeps hitting me, and they wouldn't hit me if I didn't deserve it." The disassociation is then walling off these parts because they are too painful to handle.

Neither 4E proponents nor opponents fit anywhere near that description merely by virtue of being able and willing to rationalize a few game mechanics into fiction, or not. It's very much a taste thing--and like all tastes, can be acquired and lost, changing over time, with different experiences. No matter which way you go, it's not some sign of a damaged mind, and it sure as hell isn't the mechanics damaging the mind. TA is this generation's Jack Chick.