Something, I think, Every GM/DM Should Read

[Thasmodious]

I think to deny the difference is being somewhat disingenuous.

You're focusing on the wrong things in Hussar's example. He is talking from the perspective of the people gathered around the table - why is violating a player's suspension DM prerogative, but the player violating the DMs must be remedied to the DMs satisfaction? These aren't different issues at all, you just want to confuse them by digging, once again, into the minutia of the example, as the prone snake thing turned into in three different threads, instead of focusing on the overall issue.

In example after example, people have shown how you could trip up a snake, most of which boil down to "watch the Crocodile Hunter". It's not bad that something caught the DM as "wonky" and he addressed it. However, his vision is not the sole imagination in play and a reasonable explanation by a player should just move the game along.

In Hussar's example we see the same thing. A player sees the "wonky" because a Manticore is out of his natural habitat. If he brings it up as a player, all the DM need do is shrug, grin, and say "I know. Maybe there's something to that" (even if there isn't and he just stuck a manticore there because he wanted to). This is leaving aside any meta-knowledge issues on the part of the player in question.

The point of the examples are the same and at the center of the argument thats now raged through three threads - are we here to watch the DMs imagination above all others, or are we engaging in a collaboratively imagined gameworld?

I, vastly, prefer the latter. And the latter does not cede DM authority, it just doesn't dismiss the imaginations and creativity of the other 3-5 brains around the table.

 

[Raven Crowking]

Some years ago, I was running a game (2e D&D, as I recall) and threw a manticore at the party. One of the players cried foul stating that manticores don't exist in the terrain where the party was adventuring. He was, in fact, correct by the rules.

So, what should I have done as DM? Should I have stopped the encounter and rewritten it with a setting appropriate creature? After all, this is precisely what you are doing with the Prone Snake question - changing the game based on one person's sense of believability.

You're focusing on the wrong things in Hussar's example. He is talking from the perspective of the people gathered around the table - why is violating a player's suspension DM prerogative, but the player violating the DMs must be remedied to the DMs satisfaction?

Let us examine, if you will.

In the prone snake example, the claim is that the rule doesn't make sense within the fiction.

In the manticore example, the claim is that the fiction doesn't make sense within the context of the rules.

My answer to both is exactly the same: The fiction trumps the rules. Therefore, in both cases, the rules cede to the fiction. Interestingly enough, I imagine that Hussar didn't rewrite the encounter; he chose the fiction over the rules (as, IMHO, he should have), if, of course, you accept, as Hussar argues, that the terrain listing for creatures are "rules".

That said, the GM has the perogative of throwing unexpected, and perhaps suspension-of-disbelief-bending, things at the players because that is part of the job description. Likewise, the GM has the perogative to adjust the rules as needed to maintain the fiction because that is also part of the job description.

The interaction of the players and the GM to the rules differs because the relationship to both GM and players to the ruleset differs. The question makes as much -- and no more -- sense than saying:

How come the GM cannot determine what actions the PCs take? Are we here to watch the players' imaginations above the GMs, or are we engaging in a collaboratively imagined gameworld? Letting the GM determine what the PCs do does not cede player authority, it just doesn't dismiss the imagination and creativity of the brain at the head of the table.​

No, thank you.


RC

 

[billd91]

The point of the examples are the same and at the center of the argument thats now raged through three threads - are we here to watch the DMs imagination above all others, or are we engaging in a collaboratively imagined gameworld?

I, vastly, prefer the latter. And the latter does not cede DM authority, it just doesn't dismiss the imaginations and creativity of the other 3-5 brains around the table.

The DM and players are engaged in a a collaboratively imagined game world, but that doesn't mean that the players have equal power with the DM over the details.

Disallowing effects of powers in situations where they don't make sense does not dismiss the imagination and creativity of the other 3-5 brains around the table any more than applying the written word of the power's effects embraces their imagination and creativity. Depending on the approach taken, disallowing the effects of a power may be based on quite a bit more creativity than simply allowing the rules to play out as written. There's most definitely a middle ground in there, a mix of creative application of the rules and creative negation of them.

 

[Thasmodious]

In the prone snake example, the claim is that the rule doesn't make sense within the fiction.

In the manticore example, the claim is that the fiction doesn't make sense within the context of the rules.

This is what you keep missing in the snake discussions -

The claim is that the rule doesn't make sense within the fiction to ONE person at the table, the DM. It does make sense to the player and said player offers an explanation of how his power still works within the fiction, and the DM still flatly rules that snakes can't be "proned".

Like I said, I have no issue with tripping a snake tripping someone's sensibilities, but once reasonable explanations have been put forth, there is no need for the DM to dismiss the imaginative vision of the player and trump the players abilities.

PC: ...and this knocks the snake prone
DM: How do you knock a snake prone?!
PC: You've seen people handle large dangerous snakes on TV, right? Well, that's what Thorax the Munificent does here, as the snake lunges for a strike, Thorax catches it off balance, delivers his Sweeping Strike and the snake ends up twisted onto its back, it's ventral scales up in the air.
Good DM response: ok, makes sense, Barbarous Dan, it's your turn.
Bad DM response: I invalidate your reasonable explanation, your imagination, and your very right to exist. Begone from my sight, foul beast. Henceforth, everyone at the table is commanded to shun the player of Thorax and all future generations of his line!

 

[Fifth Element]

You're focusing on the wrong things in Hussar's example. He is talking from the perspective of the people gathered around the table - why is violating a player's suspension DM prerogative, but the player violating the DMs must be remedied to the DMs satisfaction?

In the "#1 rule for DMing" thread, my contribution was to remember that you're not the only one at the table, and your preferences are not the only ones that matter. It's relevant here.

If the DM is the only one with the problem, regardless of what kind of justification he provides (such as "fiction trumps rules!"), then he's wrong. He can choose to stop DMing for that group, of course, and if it's that big of a deal to him then he probably should. I'd ask if tripping a snake was really worth giving up everything else, then take over the reins if needed.

 

[Raven Crowking]

This is what you keep missing in the snake discussions -

The claim is that the rule doesn't make sense within the fiction to ONE person at the table, the DM.

Um...no. I am not missing that point. I just don't think it relevant.

In the prone snake example, the claim is that the rule doesn't make sense within the fiction.

In the manticore example, the claim is that the fiction doesn't make sense within the context of the rules.

In neither case, is the number of people to whom the disconnect exists relevant. For that matter, in neither case is the number of people for whom the disconnect exists even known.

The GM has the perogative of throwing unexpected, and perhaps suspension-of-disbelief-bending, things at the players because that is part of the job description. Likewise, the GM has the perogative to adjust the rules as needed to maintain the fiction because that is also part of the job description.

The interaction of the players and the GM to the rules differs because the relationship to both GM and players to the ruleset differs. If the player offers an explanation of how his power still works within the fiction, and the GM agrees that this doesn't violate the fiction, then the GM should not flatly rules that snakes can't be "proned".

Of course, if the GM did rule that way, then he wouldn't really be making sense from any perspective, would he?

The GM might determine that it is more difficult to "prone" a snake than a man, though, and I'd be cool with that as well.

The problem is that your argument relies upon "reasonable explanations have been put forth" and the question remains whether or not that is so. I've got no problems with snakes being knocked prone under some circumstances (as described upthread), nor do I have a problem with your "Good DM response".

However, I think that your example "Bad DM" simply doesn't exist. BUT if that's the only person you're worried about.........?

 

[Ariosto]

The DM thinks it's unbelievable and uses his authority at the table to enforce his opinion. OTOH, when the player is confronted with something he knows to be wrong, he's told to shut up and keep playing.

It's the DM's job to moderate the game so that everyone can have fun -- not to let one player dictate contentiously for his own fun at everyone else's expense.

As usual, it astounds me to contemplate the relationships and motives you seem to consider normative.

If the players as a body disagree strongly enough with a referee's rulings, then said ref may end up without players. A player who enough disrupts the game may find himself without a referee or fellow players.

Considering, however, that we are (or at least I am) talking about a social engagement among friends who enjoy each others' company and value each others' perspectives, why should not said friends be able to have a friendly conversation?

 

[Ariosto]

The point of the examples are the same and at the center of the argument thats now raged through three threads - are we here to watch the DMs imagination above all others, or are we engaging in a collaboratively imagined gameworld?

As a player in a role-playing game, I am here to play my role -- not to play God with the whole world! If I do not like some aspect of that world, that is but a little annoyance next to not liking to get dragged out of my role-playing to dictate that a tiger I have (via my persona) perceived is "not really there".

The "trip a snake" problem is fundamentally the problem of putting the manipulation of an abstract mathematical game first and last, reducing role-playing to a superficial "skinning" of the real game.

If, instead, we are concerned first with role-playing, then I, via my persona, am interacting with the snake in physical ways (envisioned in imagination). THAT is the first of all things, the archetype of which any 'mechanical' apparatus is just a model.

This being so, we are free to critique any model as being inadequate for the present purpose and to choose instead one that actually does what we want to do.

The emerging 4e philosophy is more often to emphasize a "pure game" at the potential expense of role playing.

In a story telling game, on the other hand, I am indeed here to stage-manage the secondary world, whether collaboratively (vs. only the game system) or competitively (vs. other participants' preferred plot lines). I do not want to be confined to interacting with the world via any given persona.

In such a game, the aspect of limited information, exploration and discovery is not the same as in a role-playing game. Hence, I wonder what the rationale is for having a Game Master in the first place. I suspect that failure carefully to consider that question may be at the root of some people's difficulties.

 

[Raven Crowking]

Can't XP you right now, Ariosto, but that is a great post.

RC

 

[Fifth Element]

It's the DM's job to moderate the game so that everyone can have fun -- not to let one player dictate contentiously for his own fun at everyone else's expense.

But what if the one player dictating for his own purposes at everyone else's expense is the DM?

The example being discussed is not one player tripping a snake and the other players being up in arms about it; it's a player tripping a snake and the DM vetoing it because it doesn't fit into his conceptions.