D&D 4E The Best Thing from 4E

[pemerton]

I won't pretend kruthiks offer much in the way of campaign- or even adventure-fodder, but they can certainly make a unique low-level encounter. I enjoyed the section of KotS where the party explores a kruthik warren; narrow little tunnels filled with skittering little horrors popping out of the walls. Awesome! Double awesome because none of my players were familiar enough with them to have any idea what they are.

At one time I sketched out a kruthik warren along the lines you describe, but it never came into play. I think the PCs found another way out (or maybe went further down).

 

[The Crimson Binome]

Which module? I didn't know we were talking about a module.

In this case, I was referring to the module where all of the portals exit to the various realms, and advice is given to the DM to tell players that Lolth is probably not through those. The fact that this sort of thing made it into an official module would indicate that it is the sort of game that DMs are expected to run.

So in these games, the GM puts in the office for a veneer of verisimilitude, but it is also a potential resource for players to exploit. In this era, it would be considered a bad example of dungeon design to put in a choice which (i) cannot be scoped out in advance of being made, and (ii) is an autolose.

I don't get where anyone decided that this is an auto-lose. It's just a possibility. If you go that way, you increase the chance that you won't make whatever time constraint, but decrease the chance of being caught uninformed at some point in the future.

Once you get to modern world and adventure design, with contemporary standards of verisimilitude, coherent backstory, etc, it seems to me there are two ways of going. Roughly speaking, yours is one: the GM authors and has unilateral control over this word, which is not designed primarily as a gamepiece, and the consequence is that there is no player agency (at least as I am focusing on it).

Mine is the other: the rules and procedures of the game preserve and foster player agency of the sort that I am interested in, and as a consequence the world gets filled out over the course of, and partly as a product of, play. This preserves the early convention that there will be no autolose options, but it abandons the early convention of a Spartan, paper-thin world written up in the GM's dungeon key.

That's a fairly succinct way of putting it. Your method gives you the kind of player agency that you care about, and mine gives me the kind of player agency that I care about. We have different priorities, so we prefer different approaches in pursuit of those goals.

 

[JamesonCourage]

Two things.

One, it's not an outcome - it's a starting point.

According to thefreedictionary.com:

out·come
n.
An end result; a consequence

What is the result of the players turning left or right? The end result (or consequence) is that they reach the ritual as it is in progress.

It's exactly what I've described. The railroading is only enough to start the scene, yes. But it's railroaded to open it, since the outcome of their decision (at the fork, in this scenario) is entirely decided by the GM's whim. It's exactly the GM's desired outcome.

Two, it reflects the players' desires, not the GM's.

And if the players are on board, awesome. If they're not, then it's no fun for the players. Like I said, if the players like the rails, what's the problem?

So it doesn't fit either limb of your definition.

Wrong.

 

[JamesonCourage]

Yeah, I sort of think your definition of railroading might be a little too broad in scope. Its pretty peculiar to say that if a player ASKS for something and then the DM makes it happen that because it was then the DM making it happen that it is a railroad.

I'm not sure what you had in mind here. I'm talking about when a GM forces an outcome no matter what the players do. Can you expand on what you mean by WHEN A PLAYER asks for SOMETHING?

It may be possible that could be true, in some situation, maybe, but 99.9% of the time nobody is going to call that a railroad and in a large number of situations it would be outright absurd to do so. Not only that but you've said it yourself, it has to be the GM's desired outcome. I hardly think it counts when the GM's desire is "the players get the plot they asked for."

If you mean the players say "I want a fight, please," and the GM says "okay, I'll throw you guys into a fight." Then he contrives a fight scene (naturalistic or not- we'll say something plausible for their circumstances), then yeah, that's railroading, in my opinion. Their choices don't matter. It just sounds like enjoyable rails.

I scene-frame stuff all the time in my superhero one-shots. It's a good technique, and my players have a blast with it (and know I'm doing it). It's cool. I'm not saying it's an un-fun technique.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

I'm not sure what you had in mind here. I'm talking about when a GM forces an outcome no matter what the players do. Can you expand on what you mean by WHEN A PLAYER asks for SOMETHING?

If you mean the players say "I want a fight, please," and the GM says "okay, I'll throw you guys into a fight." Then he contrives a fight scene (naturalistic or not- we'll say something plausible for their circumstances), then yeah, that's railroading, in my opinion. Their choices don't matter. It just sounds like enjoyable rails.

I scene-frame stuff all the time in my superhero one-shots. It's a good technique, and my players have a blast with it (and know I'm doing it). It's cool. I'm not saying it's an un-fun technique.

Yeah, I'm quite lost as to what makes it 'rails'. Where do these 'rails' come from? The players say (in some fashion) "we want a fight", the GM then assesses the fiction and gives the players a choice that will allow them to engage in a fight. Its no more or less of a railroad than your Naturalistic play scenario where the world design is geared towards funneling the players into a fight at this point, except the players got a say in it. I guess if you want to call that 'railroading', happy trails to you, I doubt you'll find ANY discussion of RPG design and play that won't balk at that definition though.

 

[Balesir]

You can have the DM describe each conversation in vague terms as it is overheard, and only go into detail if the player indicates that they want to pay attention. Mention that there are some people over there talking about the weather, and someone at the bar who is drinking heavily and complaining about her boss.

Yeah, as [MENTION=82106]AbdulAlhazred[/MENTION] said, this is fine and dandy for one evening in the pub, but it applies to most of the 16-odd waking hours in every character's day. Do you really play out in this mode the shopping expeditions, the workday, visiting the restroom (which, let's face it, is a prime source of the best in gossip!), etc.? It's just not credible that every moment a character spends "in public" is covered, so there must be some abstraction - and that means some selection of instances.

I just can't agree, given the definition of the word.

Dictionary definitions are all very well for winning semantic arguments, but look at the etymology of the word - meaning-less; devoid of meaning. Meaning is derived from information, ergo if the players and the characters have no information there can be no meaning for them, at the time the decision is made. The GM has information, sure, and in the fullness of time the players and characters might (or might not) gain it - but at the time of the decision they have no information, so no derivation of meaning is possible.

At any rate, I only skimmed your reply to Saelorn. Nothing on most of it spurs a particular reply in me.

It's a shame for me that you only skimmed it, since I am discussing here because I am testing my own new-found lack of "faith" in sim roleplaying, so any insight would be welcome. But you don't have to supply insight on demand, obviously.

This was a good post on the Spartan world!

Thank you!

My point of disagreement is in respect of the last sentence: I think the difference between the two approaches is not slight, at least in extended campaign play. Because in extended campaign play the effects of decisions compound and snowball - so in a GM/system-driven approach, the game ends up being the players exploring the GM's world/story; whereas in the player-driven approach, the game ends up being some sort of expression of the players' conceptions of their characters and those PCs' goals.

Hmm, that wasn't quite what I was driving at. The methods have different agendas, for sure, and the output might thus be expected to be different.

The "crisis of faith" I refer to above, though, relates to the concept that "naturalistic" or "world centred" running of a game generates a dynamic that is fundamentally different to that assumed for Story Now! or Gamist play. I am becoming more convinced that it does not - hence "the difference is slight". If we are to identify a really coherent and powerful agenda in Sim play, I am beginning to think we must take this into account - and I would dearly like to have a genuinely functional Sim system in the same vein as 4E, FATE, BW and so on for Narrativist and/or Gamist play. I say this not because I dislike Nar/Gam play, but because I still believe there is a truly coherent Sim agenda to be found and I want all three! I guess I want the next wave - Indie Sim!

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

The "crisis of faith" I refer to above, though, relates to the concept that "naturalistic" or "world centred" running of a game generates a dynamic that is fundamentally different to that assumed for Story Now! or Gamist play. I am becoming more convinced that it does not - hence "the difference is slight". If we are to identify a really coherent and powerful agenda in Sim play, I am beginning to think we must take this into account - and I would dearly like to have a genuinely functional Sim system in the same vein as 4E, FATE, BW and so on for Narrativist and/or Gamist play. I say this not because I dislike Nar/Gam play, but because I still believe there is a truly coherent Sim agenda to be found and I want all three! I guess I want the next wave - Indie Sim!

I don't think 'Simulationist' IS an agenda, or at least its some sort of esoteric 'unicorn' agenda that doesn't exist in the real world. That's why I like the label 'Naturalist' (maybe there's a better one than that even). It connotes the striving to have a 'naturalistic' process. Its not necessarily or even predominantly about simulation, it need not in any sense attempt to simulate any extant world at all, or it could simply follow on from some literary source, etc. [MENTION=6775031]Saelorn[/MENTION] really has expounded it pretty well in its purest form. The game world simply exists. It is composed entirely of exactly whatever the GM has placed into it, and any additions are intended to be purely logical extrapolations therefrom. Adjudication of character actions is intended to be purely causal and INTERNAL in nature, nothing outside the narrative reality is supposed to factor in, and the narrative is supposed to evolve purely according to mechanical rules supplemented by some sort of 'naturalistic judgment' of a notional unbiased participant.

The thing that has really always alluded me, except in terms of purely 'skilled play' of a Gygaxian sort, is what exactly the result is supposed to be?

 

[TwoSix]

I've seen it, of course, but as to its frequency, I have no idea so I'll have to take your word on the commonality of it!

Purely anecdotal for me. I'm more looking at my old books from the '90s with modern design sensibilities and thinking through what the actual best play agenda for those games are, and what the game designers view as, for lack of a better term, "virtuous" play. That is, what play style should actively be rewarded.

 

[Tony Vargas]

I don't think 'Simulationist' IS an agenda, or at least its some sort of esoteric 'unicorn' agenda that doesn't exist in the real world. That's why I like the label 'Naturalist' (maybe there's a better one than that even).

Heh. After some long edition-war-era rants from 'simulationists,' I concluded that a simulationist game is one that makes the kinds of sacrifices you would have to make to modify a playable game into an accurate simulation. That is, balance and even basic fairness are right out, anathema to the agenda - and playability is just the bare minimum to make the exercise possible, if tedious. But, it makes those sacrifices for their own sake, not to simulate anything.

It connotes the striving to have a 'naturalistic' process. Its not necessarily or even predominantly about simulation, it need not in any sense attempt to simulate any extant world at all, or it could simply follow on from some literary source, etc. [MENTION=6775031]Saelorn[/MENTION] really has expounded it pretty well in its purest form. The game world simply exists.
The thing that has really always alluded me, except in terms of purely 'skilled play' of a Gygaxian sort, is what exactly the result is supposed to be?

The players exploiting the necessarily imbalanced mechanics to maximum advantage? (I guess that's 'skilled play.')
The DM showing off his imagined world with the players as tourists?
Re-running a typical genre story but having it turn out 'right' instead of conforming to genre tropes?
(ie: Thulsa Doom polymorphs Conan into a nematode, Dominates(pi) the hot princess, and takes over the world; Ganfalf uses The One Ring to destroy/become Sauron, Dominates(pi) Galadriel, and takes over the world; Merlin disintegrates the Stone, renders Excalibur for Mana, Dominates(pi) Morgan le Fey, the Lady of the Lake, & Guinevere, and conquers England; etc...)

 

[TwoSix]

The "crisis of faith" I refer to above, though, relates to the concept that "naturalistic" or "world centred" running of a game generates a dynamic that is fundamentally different to that assumed for Story Now! or Gamist play. I am becoming more convinced that it does not - hence "the difference is slight". If we are to identify a really coherent and powerful agenda in Sim play, I am beginning to think we must take this into account - and I would dearly like to have a genuinely functional Sim system in the same vein as 4E, FATE, BW and so on for Narrativist and/or Gamist play. I say this not because I dislike Nar/Gam play, but because I still believe there is a truly coherent Sim agenda to be found and I want all three! I guess I want the next wave - Indie Sim!

I think that might be a fairly difficult proposition. The Sim agenda diverges from Gamist or Narrativist play because of its express focus AWAY from the PC's needs and goals, and focuses on the development of events within the fiction progressing algorithmically, rather than based on dramatic need. The DM acts as the interpreter of these events into descriptions that are within the spatial and sensory bounds of the PCs.

Basically, world and NPC creation acts a set of initial parameters. The algorithms that drive the determination of what events occur are the DM's views of NPC psychology and either random charts or DM's desire as to how larger events within the "world" play out (such as armies attack the PC's home country or a meteor crashes into the town square).

Now, I think the sticking point is that generation of large amount of background information that can be readily deployed to the players, as well as the effects of a large amount of procedurally generated content, is something that can be done much more readily on the computer than at the tabletop. And I think it's no coincidence that RPG design leaned towards PC focused play and away from world design at the same time that electronic games began to be able to support group play and the building of elaborate fantasy worlds. (See MMOs and games like Dragon Age or Elder Scrolls.) Play oriented around a PC's goals is a trick that electronic games aren't capable of (yet), and it makes sense RPG design would focus on the attributes that electronic gaming can't provide.