D&D 5E To boxed text or not to boxed text

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I have to admit that I like boxed text. Heck, I really don’t mind the presumptions usually because often they are either on target - the party did the expected thing - or they are probably more interesting than what I’d come up with on the fly.

Improv is not something I do well. So having that box there is usually a good thing for me.

Then again, if I wanted to do rpg improv, DnD is probably the last system I’d use. Far, far too rules heavy.

lowkey13 said:

you seem to be going out of your way to ruin other people's fun by demanding that modules be written to your preferences, which are not shared by other people (and which do not matter to you).

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As best I'm aware [MENTION=6696971]Manbearcat[/MENTION] and I exercise no influence over the hobby-gaming publishing industry other than as participants in the consumer side of the market. Whose fun do you think we're ruining? Are you saying we're morally obliged to pay for or advocate for boxed text modules so that others can derive their perceived beneift from them?

The OP asked for views and preferences. I gave mine, and offered some explanation for them. You would prefer my preferences not be univesalised. Fine. I would prefer that others' preferences not be universalised, for two reasons.

(1) I prefer a hobby where fewer GMs are taught that pre-secripted narration and railroading is at the heart of RPGing;

(2) If the preference for boxed-text was universalised then I wouldn't be able to purchase excellent products like the Prince Valiant Episode Book. Nor would I have the use of such classic, box-free scenarios as B2. Part of what makes B2 usable by me is that it presents a place (the Keep) and a series of situations (the proximity of the Cves; the evil cleric; etc) but no pre-supposed plot in the form of boxed text.

Which goes back to [MENTION=6696971]Manbearcat[/MENTION]'s recent posts: the claim that beginning GMs need the support of boxed text because spontaneous creation of imagined content and narration is hard is a controversial claim. And the idea that there's something special about D&D in this respect is also conroversial. D&D benefits from pre-drawn maps, and from pre-statted NPCs and creatures; but in my view there's nothing about D&D as a RPG that makes pre-packaged narration especially important.

pemerton said:

(2) If the preference for boxed-text was universalised then I wouldn't be able to purchase excellent products like the Prince Valiant Episode Book. Nor would I have the use of such classic, box-free scenarios as B2. Part of what makes B2 usable by me is that it presents a place (the Keep) and a series of situations (the proximity of the Cves; the evil cleric; etc) but no pre-supposed plot in the form of boxed text.

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I'm not buying what you're selling.
B10 is (1) an excellent product worth purchasing (2) that you can still use well despite the boxed-text

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77IM said:

James Introcaso is my new favorite person. I thought he was just a dude who hangs out with Johnn Four, but it turns out he's EVERYWHERE. Mark my words, James Introcaso is the Shawn Merwin of our generation.

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Hey thank you so much!!! Shawn is one of my favorite people, so I consider this a HUGE compliment.

lowkey13 said:

And I will repeat and reiterate what other commenters have said regarding the last sentence I have quoted here- there is nothing necessarily that pre-supposes plot when there is boxed text regarding a room description; you appear to be shoehorning an argument that you have about RPGs in general into a thread that is not about that. Stop trying to make fetch happen, and please stop trying to turn this into a debate about preferred styles of RPGing, especially given that you don't seem to be playing much D&D or 5e or using the new modules for those systems (which is what this discussion is largely about).

I mean, if you are- if you regularly playing 5e, and have a lot to say about the future APs, then great- let's chat about that. We can start with a discussion of the use in APs, or just LMoP.

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Thank you.

I'm the last person to take the high ground on discussing preferred styles of RPGs turning up in various threads that aren't ostensibly about that, but holy cow, at least I'm talking about D&D.

Manbearcat said:

* LE's statement could be construed as topic drift (either because it plain is or because it isn't an outright truism) but isn't absolute topic drift. The only way it becomes actual topic drift is if someone voices their disagreement and related conversation ensues.

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Can I vote for this one?

Can I just say that I'd much rather be talking about the genesis of GMing and then discussing how that hooks into the utility (or the problem) of "boxed text"?

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Then start a thread!

pemerton said:

Nor would I have the use of such classic, box-free scenarios as B2. Part of what makes B2 usable by me is that it presents a place (the Keep) and a series of situations (the proximity of the Cves; the evil cleric; etc) but no pre-supposed plot in the form of boxed text.

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And see this is why when I was 10 years old we thought B2 sucked and was useless. Because we didn't know what to do with it.

Now a days I would have no trouble using B2. But that's because I had boxed text to train educate me on one way of DMing.

Look, we have examples from [MENTION=6563]Azzy[/MENTION] that boxed text did him harm. We have examples from me that boxed text benefited us.
Good thing their isn't only one way to play the game huh? Or that not every module and system is written according to some monolithic approach.

But, based on my experience, the good boxed text, or scripted narration, provides to new DMs is why I will keep recommending to authors that they use it.

pemerton said:

@Manbearcat, such a good example!

Well, I'll answer for my part (given that I'm advocating dot points over boxed text): I pay adventure designers to think of situations (characters, motivations, places pregnant with phantastical possibility, etc) that I can't think of myself. A good recent example: Jerry D Grayson's contribution to the Prince Valiant Episode Book, The Crimson Bull. No boxed text. Here're the opening paragraphs:

EPISODE TYPE: Assistance. The heroes are asked to help deliver a bull to an ancient pagan ceremony

Begin With: It is a rainy day as the Adventurers travel down a muddy rural path. As the heroes round the bend, the see an overturned cart and scattered bodies of peasants. A single old man lies beaten and moaning against a tree. In his right hand, he holds a silken black rope tied to a large Highland red bull. The bull eyes the Adventurers passively, but does not leave the old man’s side.​

I can't remember how I narrated this opening, but the resulting session was full of atmosphere and suspense and a dramatic resolution in which one of the PC knights converted the pagan wise woman to Christian worship by his demonstration of the power of St Sigobert over an evil spirit. We have only one player in our group who is a 5e player - to quote from my linked actual play post, "he was very impressed with the Crimson Bull scenario, and the uncertainty he felt right up until the end about the nature of the evil in the bull and the way it was going to resolve." He compared it favourably to the 5e treatment of magic and the supernatural.

I think atmosphere created through nicely crafted narration leans on the weakest aspect of RPGing: as narrative experiences, how is RPGing meant to compare to the well-written and edited fiction of a book or a film? Whereas I think that atmosphere created through nicely crafted situation plays to the strength of RPGs, which is providing players with the opportunity to provide their own creative, what-would-I-do-if-I-was-there responses to those situations.

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To add some clarification, I pay them to do that, but I pay them to do it well. Any old sod can be creative and I'd argue that most of us here are probably particularly skilled at at. But we (well, we might) don't have editors and publishers and playtesters to ensure that what we are creating is particularly refined. We might have the raw information and a general idea of how we want to present it, but until we actually go out and do that we don't have a nice and refined approach.

This, frankly, is the only reason I assume that people actually buy modules, adventures and settings, because not only do they provide interesting information, but they also provide cohesive thematic elements that bring all of these bits of information together in a very particularly appealing way. You're not just getting a wiki article, you're getting a wiki article with some dramatic flair.

In your Strahd example, what creates atmosphere is not the narration, but the invitations the situation offers to my PC: Do I shut the window and block out the moonlight? (And if I entered the room by flying through the window, does that mean I'm shutting off my own path of escape?); Do I uncover the furniture; and, perhaps most importantly, Do I shatter the mirror?

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Er, no. These things are quite frankly, not atmosphere. Those are all things you are doing in response to the situation you find yourself in, which is not atmosphere. Not even close. I'm actually a little befuddled how you can even argue that. The atmosphere is the "pervading tone or mood", in this case, of the room. Your decisions are a reaction to the atmosphere of the room.
The furniture unsettles you, so you uncover it. The mirror weirds you out, so you smash it. The open window is both a means of escape and saftey, but also a venue for attack and danger.

Your choices there are reactions to the atmosphere I established. Yes, you would have reactions to those objects without the atmosphere injection, but would those reactions be ones of fear? Which is the guiding theme of Curse of Strahd (and its predecessors).

The new AL modules I have looked at have nothing and the DM needs to squirrel out bits to relay to the players. I would argue that there needs to be something saying this is what the PCs know, see, whatever. This can be boxed text or bullet points that I expand on. Something needs to be in a 'box' so DMs know what players need to know.

Personally, I have no problem with boxed text and use it most of the time, but if the PCs are doing something different than normal I modify it. The writers need to assume how most parties, or their home party, would enter the room and it becomes a starting point.