Player Control, OR "How the game has changed over the years, and why I don't like it"

[Vegepygmy]

What I HATE is that the game has allowed the players to say "no, do this". They have dailies that let them shut down the combat entirely. And while they ARE just dailies, there are enough of them that they can do this three or four times. Meaning, for three or four hours out of every in-game "Day", I'm sitting around having the players dictate a large part of the combat to me.

Maybe it's a matter of the degree to which this is true, but I don't really see the difference between a daily power that forces your monster to fall prone (4E) and a Trip attack that causes your monster to fall prone if the PC wins an opposed Strength check (3E). In both cases, there are rules, and the rules apply to both players and DMs. IMO, that's a Good Thing, and I simply don't share your frustration.

Now, it is definitely true that earlier editions of the game did not have official rules for knocking opponents prone. DMs had much more responsibility/leeway then to adjudicate such actions. If that's what you're longing for, I understand, but I simply don't share your feelings. In the Bad Old Days (TM), DMs would constantly make ad hoc rulings for such things, and in my experience (just my experience, people!) there were a lot of really bad/misguided DMs making inconsistent rulings, simply disallowing such actions, fudging results, etc.

So I actually prefer the New Way, both as a player and a DM. It does force the DM to master his knowledge of the rules, but again, I think that's a Good Thing.

 

[Wik]

Maybe it's a matter of the degree to which this is true, but I don't really see the difference between a daily power that forces your monster to fall prone (4E) and a Trip attack that causes your monster to fall prone if the PC wins an opposed Strength check (3E). In both cases, there are rules, and the rules apply to both players and DMs. IMO, that's a Good Thing, and I simply don't share your frustration.

Except in 4e, that trip attack is generally something like "you knock the target prone" as part of the attack. And you can knock a giant prone with it. Or an ogre. Or a centaur. Or a millipede. Or an ooze. All with the same chance of success.

And if I say "well, it's a carrion crawler. How are you knocking it prone?" and refuse to allow it, I'm being a jerk GM or going against the rules and essentially nerfing a player ability. While I might still do that from time to time, I have to be really careful - if I keep nerfing that ability, I'm really just hosing the player.

 

[GSHamster]

And if I say "well, it's a carrion crawler. How are you knocking it prone?"

Flip it over onto its back?

Sounds to me like you just need to be a little more inventive when describing what happens in combat.

The alternative is the horror that was 3E Trip and Grapple rules. The words "I try to trip him" should not require pulling out the rulebook.

 

[Mad Zagyg]

Wik, I just thought I'd chime in to confirm my identical experience with you on this matter. It's one of the many changes to D&D that has played such an enormous role in the rift that exists in the player base.

I've often joked around with my group that D&D would be an awesome game if it weren't for the friggin' players. A joke, obviously, but one that holds some meaning.

This isn't just a 4e problem either, although it's the first edition to totally embrace player control at the expense of DM control. You can see signs of it taking hold in late 3.5 as the philosophy of the game designers shifted. Take the Magic Item Compendium from 3.5 for example. A book that contains the nefarious quote, "A player points to an item published in this book or the Dungeon Master's Guide and asks, 'Can I buy this?' The answer should usually be, 'Yes.'" This is quite a different philosophy from the 1st Edition Dungeon Master's Guide, the first words of which read, "What follows herein is strictly for the eyes of you, the campaign referee. As the creator and ultimate authority in your respective game, this work is written as one Dungeon Master equal to another."

The DM's role as narrator of the game has remained relatively intact. There is even a fair argument that his role as narrator has been strengthened with some additional freedoms allowed in the mechanics of 4e. Power level and control of combat however has shifted heavily into the hands of the players. The primary effect of this is to reduce the sense of mystery and discover the game once held.

 

[wayne62682]

And if I say "well, it's a carrion crawler. How are you knocking it prone?" and refuse to allow it, I'm being a jerk GM or going against the rules and essentially nerfing a player ability. While I might still do that from time to time, I have to be really careful - if I keep nerfing that ability, I'm really just hosing the player.

This is a personal bugbear for me since my DM has in the past done something similar (told me my Fighter couldn't push a giant with an Encounter power, and couldn't stop a flying creature with Combat Superiority or whatever Fighter power stops the target moving if they're marked and you hit them). I had a lengthy thread here in the old days when I was a more active poster that was ranting about it.

There is a difference now between keywords and how the ability functions; you just have to be creative in applying it. In other words you should be thinking "How DO you knock a Carrion Crawler prone?" and not "How do you knock a Carrion Crawler prone?!!"

 

[ggroy]

It's about the fact that my players now have the ability to say to me "No. I am doing this, and you have to adjust".

...

Essentially, my problem is that I feel the DM has less power than he used to at the actual table, and it makes me feel like my role is somehow less important. DMing 4e is, in my experience, less fun than DMing in other games, because it feels like less of an art, and more like a trade. If that makes any sense at all.

This is how my rpg games are for the most part, when I'm the DM. I'm quite lenient as a DM.

I DM a game that the players want, which may not always be what I want.

Before the game ever starts, I'll ask the players as a group to explain in great detail what exactly they want in the game. I'll tell them what the the consequences of their choice of houserules can produce, as to whether it will make things too easy and boring or whether it will be too hard and frustrating.

In general, I don't have much of an ego investment in the rpg games I DM. (There are other things in life much more important than rpg games, for which I will invest my ego in).

For me, I never quite understood why some individuals heavily invest their ego in DM-ing and/or playing rpg games.

 

[mach1.9pants]

Well, I have not experience of 4E beyond 10th level but it seems that the designers share your worries. The upgraded Dragon (Shademaw) recently released on Dragon (free) seems nothing more than an attempt to stop those stunlock type things. It is a great monster for Epic tier but does make me realise that the designers maybe did not fully test Epic Tier. So to stop the players auto-killing your enemies then start putting powers in like Shademaw

Instinctive Devouring
On an initiative of 10 + its initiative check, the dragon can use
a free action to charge or to use bite. If the dragon cannot use a
free action to make this attack due to a dominating or stunning
effect, then that effect ends instead of the dragon making the
attack.

Action Recovery
Whenever the dragon ends its turn, any dazing, stunning, domi-
nating, or unconscious effect on it ends.

 

[Mark CMG]

I think that RPG rules (not editions, but rather particular rules in any edition or RPG) that presuppose an adversarial relationship between the DM/GM/Referee/Facilitator and the players, and not just conflict between the characters and their opponents/environment, lose some of the spirit of RPGs.

 

[fitch3k]

We played our first session of Epic-level 4th edition the other day, and I was definitely nonplussed. It was a bizarre little game, where the Players felt almost paralyzed and powerless in some situations, and yet had the ability to basically dictate the course of the game in others.

For example, there was a tower, two hundred feet high. They couldn't figure out a way to ascend it. Even though, if they made a climb check, they'd only fail on a natural 1. After half an hour of them making plans and scratching them, I just had to snap and say "Geez. You guys are $@^#ing epic!"

And then, in a fight, they had powers that would stun monsters before they could act, that would guarantee monster movement, and interrupt powers that basically said "no, Wik, you can't do that".

And that's when I had an epiphany.

My beef with 4e has been growing for awhile. And it's not really about the rules. Or the power system. Or feat bloat. Or CrazyStupid MonsterName.

It's about the fact that my players now have the ability to say to me "No. I am doing this, and you have to adjust".

It's about the fact that, no matter what, our fighter can blow Come and Get it, and dictate the movement of my monsters. It's about the fact that, in a big fight, my players can basically stun-lock my big bad monsters, and if I say "no, that doesn't happen" I am breaking the rules and depriving them of their core strengths. It's about the fact that, if I want to do something, my players feel they have the right to say "no, this doesn't happen."

I compare this to other games (not necessarily D&D), where that was never the case. It was instead a case of me saying "the bad guy does this" and the players TRYING to prevent that from happening... not from saying, outright, that because of power X, Y happens.

Or, in other words, in other games, the players would try something and run the risk of failure, or the GM having the potential to say "no, that doesn't happen". Now, it's a matter of "Well, I missed on the attack, so he's only stunned until the end of my next turn. Now, everyone, Coup de gras him!".

Essentially, my problem is that I feel the DM has less power than he used to at the actual table, and it makes me feel like my role is somehow less important. DMing 4e is, in my experience, less fun than DMing in other games, because it feels like less of an art, and more like a trade. If that makes any sense at all.

Am I the only one who thinks like this? Does anyone have any ideas on how to fix it? Preferably BEFORE I storm out on my players in abject disgust and declare "From now on, we're only playing Call of Cthulu! Everyone dies!"

don't try and control things so much, it's really an invitation for you as a dm to be more creative. read about open hand power, it's about allowing someone else's force to hinder and frustrate them. It sounds to me like you are very forceful and that your players have figured out how to use it against you.

 

[Fifth Element]

That's too much like a player trying to dictate how the referee should rule in their favor.

I assume you mean in a competitive sport? D&D is not a competitive event (it is in fact collaborative, not combative, as a wise man said), so the analogy doesn't fly.

The game should be collaborative, not combative. But neither should the DM have to give in to every single whim of the players either. The final decision should always go to the referee.

While 4E certainly gives more narrative control than previous editions, "every single whim" is way off the mark. Way off. DMs are still DMs, and explicitly hold the final say in what happens.

Good players use strategy to fight monsters, they don't bully the DM into submission.

Wik did request no edition warring, and this strays awfully close in that it is an utter misrepresentation of how the game works in 4E.