Skills used by players on other players.

[clearstream]

If the being doing the grappling is a fellow PC? Then absolutely.

That seems okay. The groups I play with don't play that way.

 

[clearstream]

A task performed by a PC or NPC to influence a PC's thoughts does not have an uncertain outcome because the player of that character determines how the character thinks. There's no check here.

When we get into other tasks that are essentially PC vs. PC, some of us let the players resolve that among themselves through negotiation to avoid the many problems that can arise from having the DM adjudicate with the game mechanics.

It's not any more complicated than that.

Indeed yes! I read through your posts carefully and grasped that (see my reply to @Charlaquin above). It's what I meant earlier about "exogenous rules".

So while I can't agree that the RAW states or the game model requires, that it be played that way, I can certainly see that it is possible to play that way. Even that it has some advantages. For me the most straightforward way to understand it is as the addition of two rules or guidelines.

 

[GameOgre]

Indeed yes! I read through your posts carefully and grasped that (see my reply to @Charlaquin above). It's what I meant earlier about "exogenous rules".

So while I can't agree that the RAW states or the game model requires, that it be played that way, I can certainly see that it is possible to play that way. Even that it has some advantages. For me the most straightforward way to understand it is as the addition of two rules or guidelines.

I will even agree with that statement and agree that it does have a lot of advantages. It's just not how I have played the game and not how the people I play with would be happy playing. I wouldn't mind it though, frankly trying to corral these rage monkeys problem players into some semblance of a functional group even after years of game play is tiresome.

 

[Charlaquin]

That seems okay. The groups I play with don't play that way.

That’s fair. You do you.

 

[Ovinomancer]

Looking at the arguments made, it seems like two rules are being added. The first states that for some skills, what is considered is between players, not between characters. The second states that for those skills, a resolution between players commutes to a resolution between their characters. The added rules make it possible to have uncertainty when applying a skill between a player-character and a non-player character, while having certainty when applying that same skill between a player-character and another player character.

Whether a group adds those rules or not seems to me a matter of confidence and concerns. If I add those rules, then as a DM I don't need to on-the-fly make balanced calls relating to some of the hairier character-to-character possibilities, that aren't well covered by the written mechanics. Players who like more leverage over the fiction might prefer it. On the other hand, if the preference is for immersion, then I think a group wouldn't want those rules. Because instead of everything being mediated inside the fiction, as constructed by the game system, it can jump outside all that to the people around the table.

I guess I prefer the "holding to account" that I see in refusing those added rules. If Alice dumped Charisma, she's going to suck at that part of the game. To feel okay about that, I have to feel confident of offering balanced stakes in PvP situations. I also don't like the "jump outside": I prefer the characters as much as possible to be played as if they really were in the game world.

This is entirely incorrect. The process has been explained multiple times with direct references to the pages in the PHB. Not agreeing is one thing, but this strawman fabrication is something else. At this point, if you can't follow the oft explained, oft rerenced to the rulebook argument, the fault is yours*. You don't have to agree, but by goodness you shouldn't have to strawman it.

*And this isn't necessarily bad; overcoming a deep seated set if assumptions on how to play in order to see a different play paradigm is hard to do. That this different paradigm is laid out in the first pages of the PHB doesn't make it easier.

 

[Charlaquin]

Looking at the arguments made, it seems like two rules are being added. The first states that for some skills, what is considered is between players, not between characters.

That’s not an additional rule at all. There is already a rule that players control the thoughts and actions of their characters. There is no difference between considering an action between players and considering it between those player’s characters, as those players are the sole influencers of their characters’ actions.

The second states that for those skills, a resolution between players commutes to a resolution between their characters.

What does that even mean?

 

[Charlaquin]

I am focusing on the "roll required" because that's where the inconsistency is, much like a doctor would focus on your arm if that was where you had a cut. No need to xray your leg.

No, you’re ignoring two thirds of an intricately connected system and coming to an incorrect conclusion about the consistency of its function. If you completely ignore the lungs and their role in the circulatory system, then yes, naturally it’s going to seem inconsistent that blood sometimes enters the heart from the superior and inferior vena cava and leaves through the pulmonary artery but other times it enters through the pulmonary veins and exits through the aorta. That doesn’t mean the heart isn’t working properly, it just means you’re not looking at the whole picture.

I demonstrated in an earlier post how the apparent inconsistency disappears if you examine the whole task resolution process instead of assuming that there will be uncertainty and skipping to the step where a check is called for to resolve the assumed uncertainty. You agreed with it and told me you didn’t think we were on different sides of the argument.

 

[iserith]

I guess I prefer the "holding to account" that I see in refusing those added rules. If Alice dumped Charisma, she's going to suck at that part of the game. To feel okay about that, I have to feel confident of offering balanced stakes in PvP situations. I also don't like the "jump outside": I prefer the characters as much as possible to be played as if they really were in the game world.

Let's say you refuse to adopt the approach that some of us use to handle PvP. Let's also say that nobody ever engages in PvP at the table. It just never comes up. Is Alice gaining some kind of benefit in this situation?

If the answer is "no" (and that would be my response), then I don't see the need to account for Alice's character low Charisma as a good argument against such an approach. If indeed that is, in part, the argument being made. It's possible I got what you're saying wrong.

 

[iserith]

Side comment:

There seems to be an argument, directly or indirectly by multiple posters, that a player needs to "pay" in some way for having a character with a dump stat and part of paying for it is, for example, folding in an argument between characters, acting stupid or playing dumb, not sussing out a lie, etc. Or abiding by the result of an ability check by another player's character.

I would say that in a game which contains all three pillars of D&D, that player is going to pay when he or she has to make an ability check, saving throw, or attack roll that involves that ability score. The smart play is to avoid engaging in tasks that may call for such an ability check, and that's reasonable behavior from the player in my view. But you can't always avoid it, especially when it comes to saving throws. I know in my games all the characters engage in social interaction challenges and dread having to make that Charisma check when they dumped the stat. (Inspiration is their friend here.)

I therefore submit that the player is not really gaining any benefit from the DM having the players work out their PvP issues between them without reference to the mechanics. I'd even go so far to say that, if anything, doing so is a penalty of sorts, a tax on the player for their build choices which is unnecessary. There is, after all, a whole world of villains and monsters out there to lie to, steal from, and murder and all manner of social and exploration challenges in between. Why anyone would turn to the party for that conflict is a little baffling. But in any case those dump stats will come back to haunt that character without any additional burden of mechanics being used in PvP.

I hope that made sense. I'm still in the process of thinking it through.

 

[GameOgre]

This is entirely incorrect. The process has been explained multiple times with direct references to the pages in the PHB. Not agreeing is one thing, but this strawman fabrication is something else. At this point, if you can't follow the oft explained, oft rerenced to the rulebook argument, the fault is yours*. You don't have to agree, but by goodness you shouldn't have to strawman it.

*And this isn't necessarily bad; overcoming a deep seated set if assumptions on how to play in order to see a different play paradigm is hard to do. That this different paradigm is laid out in the first pages of the PHB doesn't make it easier.

I realize you are very confident on your stance and that trying to bring enlightenment to the unenlightened but if you stopped for just a moment and actually considered his posts as not wrong but from a different correct viewpoint you might actually see that point of view(not agree with it perhaps or want to play that way but at least see that his view isn't based on fallacy but a different view on the rules and spirit of the game).

What it all boils down to for the Skills are rolled verse other players crowd is role playing.

See there just are not any/many rules on role playing. Yes I think maybe somewhere there might be a paragraph about you are supposed to try and actually play your character as not you but instead as a different person and try and keep that personality as different than yours. Like being a actor. Actors do not play a character how THEY want that character to behave but instead how that CHARACTER would react. If the actor is anti-gun in political views the pro-gun character doesn't suddenly change views because he is being played by that particular actor.

In D&D there is little to help a player do this. Almost nothing.

So a great many players do not do this. They run those characters as just basically themselves. Oh sure they might realize and have to deal with different physical capabilities because the game mechanics make them but mental ones? There aren't many at all. A save mod for certain things ect is about it. So it's no wonder they do not think very much about those stats at all. Why not dump your lowest scores into those slots as there is very little drawback! In the vast majority of games they can have a 6 int and still be the brain of the group! Still come up with all the plans and be the one to figure out all the riddles and puzzles ect... It's a game like Poker man, just chill out and lets hack some stuff.

And you know what? if that's what your table wants to do and is having a blast doing then .....there is nothing wrong with that.

Different strokes for different folks.

At my table however, I would like players to not be themselves playing a pen and paper video game. I would rather them role play there characters and that means doing NOT what their players would do but what there characters would do. If one of my players created a extremely foolish pampered dandy PC and wanted to play out his slowly changing over time to a battle hardened veteran soldier, then at 2nd level when the bard of the party tried to con him into doing something foolish and using the Dandies ego to do so i would expect that player to role play that out. Probably with a persuasion roll contested by insight and if that Dandy failed the roll I would hope the Dandy would be role played appropriately.

This is one of the best things about playing rpg's.

It isn't about the DM telling anyone what they think. It isn't one player trying to get over on another. It's role playing.

Now as I said. If you and your group don't have fun doing that and do things totally differently then I'm fine with that. You do YOU! I don't say that while secretly looking down on your point of view. I get it. Your all good man.

I have played this dang game for 41 years this Christmas. I know from experience there are a VAST many ways to play the game. None of them wrong.(ok thats a lie, I have seen a few that are wrong but only because they were unfun for the people playing or predatory towards some of there members, but other than those few cases none of them wrong).

I guess my mistake when I got frustrated the other night and came to post this thread was not aiming it at one particular set of gamer.

As a topic for discussion to the entire play style arena at large of course it was bound to draw ire and fire from styles that just do not agree with the entire premise of my style(of the moment).

That style currently appreciates(at times) inter-party conflict on a wide range of levels as long as those arise from role playing reasons with an eye kept strongly on what is fun for all parties.

In my original post I should have made all this more clear and also mentioned motivation. At the time the player at issue was not a strong role player(but he is coming along slowly in that direction) who suddenly refused to take another players role playing in character into account and refused to role play the fictional character HE had built but instead just wanted to go hack stuff and ignore the role playing portion of the game.He also had a bad week and was a very moody player at the game table as sometimes happens to us all.