Introducing Complications Without Forcing Players to Play the "Mother May I?" Game

Bedrockgames said:

Posts like this are why we have such trouble having real discussions. I try to be charitable in my assessment of other peoples posts and play styles. But there are also patterns of behavior here where it becomes difficult to ignore the shade being thrown at your preference (even if it is couched in theory or jargon). If you are going to characterize playstyles as degenerate, rather than really look at what people are saying they want and are experiencing, you are going to have conflict. I would never label a playstyle or taste in gaming degenerate (partly because that is an enormously loaded term, and doesn't at all seem useful for analyzing game play). This is an equivocation. I am acknlowedging play can degenerate (just like a conversation can degenerate---i.e. using it as a verb). But that is different from using degenerate as an adjective. There is a sense of superiority coming across here that is immensely off-putting. I personally have no problem with Pemerton's style of play. And I think it meets a need that is out there. Nor do I have a problem with people looking for other various kinds of play. I do take issue when I see something I see work at the table mischaracterized (no matter how well made the argument). It is very easy to push someone into a rhetorical corner in an online discussion about playstyles. But what I am seeing just doesn't match what I see live at the table.

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Point of fact, I was discussing degenerate play, not characterizing a playstyle for which I have just started a new campaign as wholly degenerate. Every playstyle has examples where it can degenerate.

The point here was that you will find many DMs on these boards who will jump in to say that they control the world and the players have to react to them. Which goes straight to making [MENTION=42582]pemerton[/MENTION]'s point. There are similar examples of degeneration in narrative games from as well, and arguments about style and pronciple to prevent degeneration there as well, it's just not as bold as with the larger "trad" game base, where you can generally count on *someone* to show up and proclaim the players are their playthings. You haven't, and it wasn't about you.

And, that's totally not to say that "degenerate" play isn't fun, but that it has "degenerated" from a given set of play principles. A pure railroad with the party being overshadowed by uber-DMPCs is a non-controversial example of degenerate "trad" play. There are others. If the DM is ignoring player desires to present his preferred story, I think that's sufficient as an possible example of degenerate play in D&D. That doesn't say that prep and use of prep is degenerate, or a per se example of MMI.

And [MENTION=85555]Bedrockgames[/MENTION], please stop hacking up my posts into multiple separate responses. You clearly have mastery enough to edit the quotes, so it's not that you lack the technical know-how, and it makes responding to you into trying to stem the flow of a gish gallop.

Ovinomancer said:

And [MENTION=85555]Bedrockgames[/MENTION], please stop hacking up my posts into multiple separate responses. You clearly have mastery enough to edit the quotes, so it's not that you lack the technical know-how, and it makes responding to you into trying to stem the flow of a gish gallop.

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Omnivancer, I don't like doing walls of text where I quote people five times in a post. I prefer to handle points individually. I am sorry but this isn't a request I can accommodate. If you dislike my posting style, you are free to not respond, or call me a jerk. I am just posting the way I am comfortable posting.

I want to highlight the issue that when MMI arises, the (sensible) GM might be the first to suffer from that, having less fun, less purpose in the game.

I can see this is the main concern of the OP (innerdude)

Immortal Sun said:

But that isn't the context of the OP and isn't what my post was talking about.

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It is, however, a valid and interesting point. D&D hands the narrative keys over to the players without blinking if they use magic, but there's a school of thinking that you shouldn't ever do that for other action declarations. So, when talking about how action declarations should be handled in D&D, pointing out that elephant is a valid way to frame the discussion: why is it okay "if magic" but not otherwise? Not the only frame, but a valid one.

On your side, though, [MENTION=42582]pemerton[/MENTION] tends to insist that this discrepancy be resolved before moving forward, when it can exist as a sole and well understood exception to a general rule. That's a solid position as well.

Pardon the digression. I kinda like discussing the discussion on occasion. Feel free to ignore.

Ovinomancer said:

Point of fact, I was discussing degenerate play, not characterizing a playstyle for which I have just started a new campaign as wholly degenerate. Every playstyle has examples where it can degenerate.

The point here was that you will find many DMs on these boards who will jump in to say that they control the world and the players have to react to them. Which goes straight to making [MENTION=42582]pemerton[/MENTION]'s point. There are similar examples of degeneration in narrative games from as well, and arguments about style and pronciple to prevent degeneration there as well, it's just not as bold as with the larger "trad" game base, where you can generally count on *someone* to show up and proclaim the players are their playthings. You haven't, and it wasn't about you.

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I think your bar for play that has degenerated into mother may I, is different than mine. Mother May I, in my mind, is a state of play, where the players are incredibly frustrated because they keep having to push exploration buttons in the setting until they get a green light. That isn't at all the situation I was describing.

I don't think anyone has suggested the players are playthings. And I don't think my example feeds into what Pemerton is saying. It isn't an instance of play that has degenerated to mother may I. It just isn't. Pemerton is choosing to read it that way. But I have tried to explain why I don't see it as such.

Bedrockgames said:

Omnivancer, I don't like doing walls of text where I quote people five times in a post. I prefer to handle points individually. I am sorry but this isn't a request I can accommodate. If you dislike my posting style, you are free to not respond, or call me a jerk. I am just posting the way I am comfortable posting.

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I'm not talking about quoting five people or even multiple posts from one person, but you've made at least 3 different replies to 1, one, of my posts, hacking out different bits for each.

If you cannot accomodate this, that's fine, you know your limitations best. But I'll just ignore any posts past the first where you chop up my posts.

Ovinomancer said:

It is, however, a valid and interesting point. D&D hands the narrative keys over to the players without blinking if they use magic, but there's a school of thinking that you shouldn't ever do that for other action declarations. So, when talking about how action declarations should be handled in D&D, pointing out that elephant is a valid way to frame the discussion: why is it okay "if magic" but not otherwise? Not the only frame, but a valid one.

On your side, though, @pemerton tends to insist that this discrepancy be resolved before moving forward, when it can exist as a sole and well understood exception to a general rule. That's a solid position as well.

Pardon the digression. I kinda like discussing the discussion on occasion. Feel free to ignore.

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Because not all action declarations are created equal. For all the issues I have with most editions of D&D magic, in fact I even have objections to calling it "magic" at all, it still has pre-set rules and outcomes. When you cast Fireball as a 5th-level spell, you know what results that it can produce against objects within the area. When the fighter declares they are making an attack, you know what results that can produce against his targets.

But declaring "I want to take over the Thieves Guild." is not the same as saying "I shoot fireball at the orc!" As the OP belabors to explain (and I honestly think his biggest problem is he's got himself mixed up over this) that the potential results of declaring "I want to take over the Thieves Guild." are unknown. There's no rule here to determine what they are. There may not even be guidelines! Because "I want to take over the Thieves Guild." isn't an action declaration that is within the "Golden Box" of the player.

I think there's something in people's heads that leads them to "Magic can do whatever." and less so in the rules. By the rules, magic has very explicit outcomes and even the Wish spell comes with a caveat that essentially says "You can do XYZ things, and anything outside of that you have to ask your DM."

Almost everything outside of "Da Rulz" boils down to some kind of exchange between the player wanting something to happen, and the DM determining how or if it happens.

Ovinomancer said:

It is, however, a valid and interesting point. D&D hands the narrative keys over to the players without blinking if they use magic, but there's a school of thinking that you shouldn't ever do that for other action declarations. So, when talking about how action declarations should be handled in D&D, pointing out that elephant is a valid way to frame the discussion: why is it okay "if magic" but not otherwise? Not the only frame, but a valid one.

On your side, though, [MENTION=42582]pemerton[/MENTION] tends to insist that this discrepancy be resolved before moving forward, when it can exist as a sole and well understood exception to a general rule. That's a solid position as well.

Pardon the digression. I kinda like discussing the discussion on occasion. Feel free to ignore.

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If you want to give players narrative control that is fine. But magic is a thing that exists in the setting player characters are using. Narrative control is something the player wields that the characters don’t even know about. That is one possible difference. At the end of the day though resolvingvthis stuff by trying to explain them is a bad way to create principles in my view. What matters is some people, for whatever reason, are fine with magic but not narrative control. Too often I see attempts to explain why lease to principles that cause people to avoid things they might otherwise like. The only real useful thing is the immediate reaction to magic and narrative control. Efforts to explain could be wrong or fail to understand that edge cases matter.

Ovinomancer said:

I'm not talking about quoting five people or even multiple posts from one person, but you've made at least 3 different replies to 1, one, of my posts, hacking out different bits for each.

If you cannot accomodate this, that's fine, you know your limitations best. But I'll just ignore any posts past the first where you chop up my posts.

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If this bothers you, it bothers you. My reasoning for doing it this way is 1) an idea about the post occurs to me after the first response I give, so I weigh in again, 2) I like posting things in their full context most of the time (I've been increasingly moving away from isolating one point, quoting it and responding). This has just become how I am comfortable posting. By all means, if it bothers you, feel free to stick to the first post, but I feel kind of like you are issuing a command here, which makes me even more reluctant to alter how I am responding.