Why the World Exists

[Raven Crowking]

This isn't what I'm arguing. You're inventing an argument that I am not making, so please stop.

EDIT

Heh. I thought that you thought my counter-argument was a paraphrase of your argument.

D'oh!!!

Just so we're clear, then: In my paraphrase, please read "fail to work" as "fail to work properly". If it is still not your argument that the rules have failed to work properly, please explain your argument to me using small words. I've had a head cold the last week or so that's made me a bit loggy.


RC

 

[The Shaman]

Sure, I'm not arguing that. I just don't think either "extreme" is actually possible, and like I believe mallus was saying, the "types" of DM end up running a game that is in many ways very similar. (Because in the end both rely on both randomness and DM input.)

In different proportions, yes.

Again, I don't think anyone is arguing otherwise.

You've taken a random event and placed it in front of the PCs. No matter whether you created the evnt from start to finish, or you randomly rolled it, you still chose to fit it in the place you did.

I don't know that I consider them to be quite the same. A randomly generated event is self-selecting based on the dice; it is bounded in the sense that the random table isn't infinite, but the number of potential combinations may make it effectively so in the context of playing the game.

For example, I create the space encounter tables for each star system in Traveller, so there are hard limits on the number and type of ships that can be encountered, but the range of both values can run into the scores for each system. Now multiply that number by the results of the random reaction table, and now we're talking hundreds of potential encounters just in one star system.

I created the parameters under which the encounter may occur, but I don't see that as being the same thing as choosing the encounter itself, particularly give the range of possibilities.

I'm not arguing either way is better, just that it's two approaches to get to the same conclusion.

If that conclusion is fun for everyone around the table, then we're in accord.

So you randomly rolled an adventure, vrs someone who creates an adventure. Neither one offers more or less "choice" for the players. You just randomly came up with an event, whereas someone else might come up with the same event based on other factors.

Yes, but remember the random encounter, versus the one created by the referee, may be much variable in terms of the degree of hazard presented to the adventurers. It's not intrinsically so, but all else being equal, my experience tells me that encounters prepared by the referee are more likely to be be close to the adventurers' "level" than those generated randomly.

Maybe level appropriate means different things to different folks.

I don't design level appropriate things with the idea that the PCs will always be able to defeat their enemy. Just that in some way they have a chance. That chance might be easy, or it might be hard. I find this more realistic.

Whereas I prefer an environment that is indifferent to the adventurers, where encounters are based not on the adventurers but the setting.

I also design encounters based on believability. It's not believable for the mercenary cruiser, with eight batteries of missle launchers and lasers and three times the acceleration to randomly show up in the san francisco bay outside my office.

As I mentioned upthread, pirate encounters in my corner of the Third Imperium are more likely away from trade routes, naval bases, and mainworlds. The frequency of encounters with pirates is weighted based on those parameters. If the adventurers stick to main routes and patrolled systems, their likelihood of encountering a pirate is pretty low.

So while we might both use random encounters, mine are more tailored to the locations.

As are mine, but with a broader set of parameters perhaps on what can be generated.

Same thing mostly, but I also intersperse some stuff based on the actions the PCs took, and how other people would logicaly react to that, or what I've decided some NPCs are up to, or just what my group finds fun collectively.

Of course. One of the fun things about sandbox games for me is that random encounter can develop into a close alliance or a bitter rivalry, based on the actions and reactions of the adventurers and the non-player characters.

Same mostly. I tend to find that what some find promotes Coherence, internal consistency, verisimilitude promotes the opposite in others. I think it has to do with how people interpret and use the rules.

Agreed.

 

[Mallus]

In a bog-standard pirate encounter, no. Pirates want cooperative merchants who give up their cargo, and killing indiscriminately increases the chance a merchant will fight back at all costs instead of accepting the loss.

On the other hand, if the encounter is with privateers in a war zone assigned to destroying enemy shipping, then yes, then I would consider it based on the reaction roll. That's a risk the adventurers accept if they enter such an area.

I like that. In the first case the overwhelming force still represents a gameable situation, albeit one where the players only have one intelligent choice. In the second the players have the initial choice to enter the war zone or not.

Would you ever have a war zone erupt around a PC merchant crew, catching them unawares (and denying them the choice about how much risk they take on)? That's certainly possible given Traveller's lack of FTL communication.

I'm interested in cases where maintaining fidelity to the setting and its internal logic seem to come into conflict with the needs for playable game (ie situations where meaningful options exist and essentially forgone conclusions do not).

Should that be another thread? (like we haven't completely changed topic already...).

 

[Scribble]

Can you give me a couple of examples where this was the case, including how the rules implied they would work, and how they actually worked?


RC

If you want specifics, sorry I can't. I'm at work.

A broad example is it usualy involved CR, or spell power levels, sometimes even feat power levels.

EDIT

Heh. I thought that you thought my counter-argument was a paraphrase of your argument.

D'oh!!!

Just so we're clear, then: In my paraphrase, please read "fail to work" as "fail to work properly". If it is still not your argument that the rules have failed to work properly, please explain your argument to me using small words. I've had a head cold the last week or so that's made me a bit loggy.


RC

I thought I did?

Fail to work properly = the game told me the rules function in a certain way, and then fail to actually do so at points.

I'm not saying the game "stopped" working.

I think looking at it we're saying a similar thing, just from difefrent angles.

Correct me if I'm wrong: You seem to be saying that I'm looking at the rules and then determining that what they say they do is undesired and then changing it.

Whereas I'm saying I'm looking at the rules, accepting what they say they are doing, but then changing them when they end up not actually doing that.

Does that make sense?

 

[The Shaman]

In the first case the overwhelming force still represents a gameable situation, albeit one where the players only have one intelligent choice.

They may have more than one choice, for example, jumping out while inside the 100D limit and risking a misjump. The intelligence of that option is debatable, of course.

In the second the players have the initial choice to enter the war zone or not.

Would you ever have a war zone erupt around a PC merchant crew, catching them unawares (and denying them the choice about how much risk they take on)? That's certainly possible given Traveller's lack of FTL communication.

Yes.

The bloodthirstyness of the privateers is going to be determined by reaction roll, so assuming the adventurers allow them to board or are forced to yield, the crew may not necessarily end up dead with a wave of my hand. I might impose a -1 or -2 modifier to the reaction roll, but if the roll is high they could simply end up marooned instead.

That said, I would have no problem with the privateers killing off the crew if that's how it shakes out. Remember that we're talking about a perfect storm of bad luck for the adventurers: wrong place wrong time, facing overwhelming force, bad reaction. The chances of this encounter are about the same as the ancient red wyrm in a fit of pique discussed earlier.

I'm interested in cases where maintaining fidelity to the setting and its internal logic seem to come into conflict with the needs for playable game (ie situations where meaningful options exist and essentially forgone conclusions do not).

I agree that keeping meaningful options on the table is a worthy goal, but I also think that an occasional foregone conclusion, whether it's murderous privateers in space or a coup de grâce of a captive adventurer by an orc chieftain, can be a part of an enjoyable game, if the players and the referee know this is a possibility from the outset and accept that shared mental space of the game-world.

 

[Raven Crowking]

If you want specifics, sorry I can't. I'm at work.

I can wait.

 

[Scribble]

I can wait.

It'll probably be long while. I'm not looking to play anything other then 4e for now, so you'll have to deal with a made up broad example:

This creature is CR 5 but the ability it has makes it way out of line with other CR 5 stuff (and its own design.) Crap, he's poorly designed, I'll fix later, fudge for now to keep him at a better CR level.

The rules didn't suddenly "stop working" it's just they told me the creature was designed as a CR 5 creature, but it in reality it was not.

 

[Raven Crowking]

This creature is CR 5 but the ability it has makes it way out of line with other CR 5 stuff (and its own design.) Crap, he's poorly designed, I'll fix later, fudge for now to keep him at a better CR level.

The rules didn't suddenly "stop working" it's just they told me the creature was designed as a CR 5 creature, but it in reality it was not.

This is the sort of thing that I thought you meant.

CR and EL are tools to give the DM some ability to predict the outcome of a particular encounter or series of encounters, and thus to achieve a desired outcome. Perforce, the CR guidelines are not perfect, and make assumptions about how encounters are handled, and perforce, the CR guidelines will sometimes fail because the encounter is handled in a way not foreseen by the creator of the guidelines (thus seemingly "too easy" or "too hard").

However, "too easy" and "too hard" both strongly imply (I would go so far as to say have no intrinsic meaning without the existance of) a desired outcome. The entire CR system, as well as things like wish lists, etc., are a move to encourage desired outcome play. Because random elements exist within the game, though, this desired outcome does not always occur.

It is the random elements, not the rules, that are adjusted when the CR 5 creature outperforms (or underperforms) your expectations. Random elements like encounter design, player choices, and die rolls.

Fudging eliminates these random elements, thus reinforcing the desired (predicted by CR guidlelines) outcome. It is, after all, meaningless to say that you intentionally chose a CR 5 creature without also agreeing that you chose that CR because it seemed to support the encounter outcome you wanted.


RC

 

[Ariosto]

Different strokes for different folks. There are various tastes in "good" or "fun," and apparently even in "fair."

It sometimes seems here that folks are presenting a concept of "balance" as an absolute of "playability" even though it runs counter to how certain games were designed and played for a decade or more before that concept was widely embraced. (It was central to Champions in 1981, but took a while to catch on in other circles.)

D&D, for instance, was designed to produce a lot of character mortality, especially at low levels. When characters have 1d6 hit points and a hit does 1d6 damage, that's an average 50% kill rate per first hit. Avoiding the capriciousness of the dice was a survival skill. It helped that dice-rolls were prescribed for only a few activities.

The DM was empowered to modify probabilities before hand, or to waive rolls -- but that's a different matter from calling for a roll and voiding it afterward. A basic assumption, taken for granted in the war-game hobby of which D&D was a part, was that the basis for such adjustments should be "simulation" of the situation. To base them on whether they favored one side or the other was considered clearly improper.

Losing a character was not the calamity it might seem in another context, a sort of "losing the game" event. It was more like losing a round. How one did in the long run, over the whole course of play with multiple characters, was the key perspective if one wanted to "keep score."

In that long run, random factors tend to even out. The average was still pretty risky, and there were plenty of opportunities to get characters killed in more deterministic ways. The difference between a random choice and an informed one might depend on taking unusual steps to gather information.

So, most characters died before attaining high levels. The ones that became notably powerful were exceptional. Moreover, the selection pressures tended to make the accomplishment reflect a notable degree of skill at play. ("Monty Haul" campaigns were exceptions to that rule.)

That's a factor in considering, for instance, Tomb of Horrors. Although there's some benefit in the game-mechanical assets likely to be possessed by characters of the recommended level, what is thereby implied of the players is most telling.

To have earned characters of that level should have taken a considerable amount (probably more than a year) of careful play. The Tomb is a test of the game-mastery to be expected of such experienced and successful players. Presumed rather naturally was experience and success in just such a milieu as that for which the game was designed. In their essence, the puzzles, tricks and traps were pretty typical of dungeons. The wrong choice might more often result in sudden death, but the process of determining the right choice was not extraordinary. Some errors could be avoided by applying what ought (in the D&D context) to have been mere common sense well before that stage in the players' careers.

In that infamously deadly dungeon, it makes relatively little difference whether characters are 1st level or 21st. Its appropriateness is mainly geared to a certain (and somewhat elite) level of players.

 

[Majoru Oakheart]

CR and EL are tools to give the DM some ability to predict the outcome of a particular encounter or series of encounters, and thus to achieve a desired outcome. Perforce, the CR guidelines are not perfect, and make assumptions about how encounters are handled, and perforce, the CR guidelines will sometimes fail because the encounter is handled in a way not foreseen by the creator of the guidelines (thus seemingly "too easy" or "too hard").

It's not just when you use encounters in ways that are unforseen. The problem with CRs is that they are not actually mapped with difficulty. A creature with an AC of 10 and 20 hitpoints could be CR 10. A creature with AC 25 and 100 hitpoints could be CR 6. CRs are just a guess based on a formula/playtesting/eyeballing by the creator. Some creators are better at eyeballing than others and get more accurate CRs than others.

Part of the problem comes from having too much randomness to be predictable. If a creature has 2 hitpoints but has a DC 25 save or die what CR should it be? It might kill level 10 characters on the first round before they act if it goes first. It might die in one hit before it even has a chance to do anything.

But, while CR does a poor job of predicting actual difficulty, it is advertised as working so well that the entire encounter design and XP rules are based around using CR. Which creates a house of cards built on a shaky foundation. So, it sometimes requires a bit of correction on the DMs part.

However, I agree that using CRs to plan encounters DOES imply a desired result. I know, I always desire the result that the players live. At least most of them. I want to keep running the game and them to keep playing.