Why do DM's like Dark, gritty worlds and players the opposite?

[Hussar]

Stoat - I haven't played those games, but, I suppose the Baldur's Gate would be an example too. The main plot basically only advances when the player chooses to do it. Otherwise, you can wander around, doing a plethora of side plots as long as you like and the main plot will wait on hold until you come back.

Agreed, this runs contrary to how I view a sandbox campaign as well.

 

[DanM]

The DM's whom like this type of setting only want to eliminate people. They are evil. That, is why...

 

[DanM]

who cares... you forgot about my Karma GEM and its hands-of-f.a.t.e...........

 

[Nifft]

The DM's whom like this type of setting only want to eliminate people. They are evil. That, is why...

who cares... you forgot about my Karma GEM and its hands-of-f.a.t.e...........

Never have I seen a poster write such a rude reply to himself.

"Be good to yourself", -- N

 

[Garthanos]

Sure it was. The DM's perspective and the player's perspective in 1e are different. That the player says "experience points and gold all wrapped in to one huzzahh!"
RC

The game said to the players here is your prizes ... and defined how you get them. Real mechanics here ... not an abstraction and it wasnt players that made it up. THE method for winning was kill it and take its stuff ... you were the one asking why? there needed to be a correlation between treasure and winning, the game tied them together in a neat little bow saying not only do you want gold you are going to be a lesser hero if you don't get it... That is built in to the game mechanics..

And this is more about...
You took the left hand curve instead of the right.... I put coolness both you and I wanted in the game trust me it will show up later and not because of abstract philosophy or what was written in the DMG. It is because yeah I don't have the time to make up scads and scads of coolness and throw away large chunks of it for some philosophy. That is the part which makes whether you make up the adventures yourself or not more significant I will save cool room descriptions and magic items and treasure and bring them along which is a step further than saving the treasure and adding it to future tallies ...

 

[Garthanos]

As a DM, one ought to expect secret doors not to be found. Not that one should make everything depend on players not finding one, either, which would also be foolish.

Item placement based on logic sometimes resulted in things you want to be found ... being mechanically hard to find.

"Monty Haul" is an issue with DMs who make things too easy, predicated on the assumption that players want challenges commensurate with rewards.

The same presumptions are true across game editions some editions were way less guided about how much or what treasures were appropriate to the levels of the characters than others.

If players quite honestly view D&D not as a test of skill but as the story of "my awesome character getting always more awesome",

The strategic movement and resource management of 4e which everyone partakes of in 4e is very much player skill oriented.. what exactly are skills are you promoting as a feature of AD&D?

 

[FireLance]

Surely it is not that difficult to envision a gaming philosophy where "winning" and "earning treasure" are not all-or-nothing on/off switches, isn't it?

On the other hand, surely it is not that difficult to envision a gaming philosophy where XP and treasure are bundled together as a single reward for overcoming challenges, right?

This is what I had previously written on the subject:

The way I read the DMG guidelines is this: you are okay as long as you keep the treasure earned by the party in line with the XP earned by the party. In other words, if there are ten treasure parcels, the party should find approximately one treasure parcel every time it earns 10% of the XP that it needs to get to the next level.

The key idea behind this guideline is to avoid parties that are XP-heavy and treasure-light, e.g. parties who have fought several tough creatures that have no treasure, or vice-versa, e.g. parties who happen upon a stash of gold and magic items without overcoming any challenges that provide XP.

It does not mean that the party has to find every treasure parcel in an adventure: if the party misses Encounter #3, which has treasure parcel #3, it misses out on the XP and the treasure for Encounter #3. Doing so means that the party will gain levels slower than another party who has gone though the same adventure and did overcome Encounter #3. However, by the time the party has gained its next level, it would have had to overcome another encounter (possibly Encounter #1 of the next adventure) and in doing so, would have earned enough XP to gain a level and a treasure parcel approximately equal in value to the one they missed (or even the same one, if the DM wants to re-use it).

In short, XP and treasure should be bundled together as a single reward. A party can miss out on both, but should not miss out on one if it has already earned the other.​

 

[Raven Crowking]

Unfortunately Skidace and Raven Crowking, you ignored the other half of what I said.

That's because (on my part, anyway), it was a caveat, not a total disagreement.


RC

 

[Raven Crowking]

On the other hand, surely it is not that difficult to envision a gaming philosophy where XP and treasure are bundled together as a single reward for overcoming challenges, right?

Of course it isn't!

I am merely arguing against the claim that there is no actual change. Once change is acknowledged, it is possible to discuss the virtues and problems of each approach (and both do have virtues and problems, depending upon the kind of game you want to run). Until then, all open discourse is shut down.

I am simply sick of "Look how much better X is than Y!!! And at the same time X and Y are exactly the same if you happen to prefer Y to X!!!!"

I would like more honesty in the discussion.



RC

 

[Desdichado]

I agree with you wholeheartedly!

This is hardly new. What is new is that the DM is now encouraged to say "Yes" to this mindset, whereas previously the DM was encouraged to make the players work for what their PCs got.

I don't know that this was necessarily true. I mean, there was at least some lip service to this effect, but the treasure in the printed modules themselves was at odds with this advice, quite often.

At best, you could say the message from earlier D&D was schizophrenic in this regard.