A GMing telling the players about the gameworld is not like real life

[pemerton]

I disagree, the majority of systems IME don't even really talk about time. Gygax obsessed about it, but even 2e drops a lot of the mechanical baggage that 1e has around time.

<snip>

Traveler, IMHO, simply calls all time periods "1 week" in strategic play because Marc Miller wanted an 'Age of Sail' feel to his Fifth Imperium. As such jumps take a week, and he simply set all other activities to that time period. It makes play simple, Alan, Beth, and Carl take the Beowulf to Extremis while Eddie and Darla remain on Durant and spend the week looking for a patron. The GM can move both timelines forward, each group gets to make one check/decision/deal with one situation. Beowulf jumps back to Extremis, the rest of the party shops for the equipment needed to carry out the mission assigned by the patron, and play can continue both plausibly and in a dramatically satisfying way. At the time when Traveler was written this was basically a state-of-the-art playing methodology. It sure beat Gygax's 'track every minute for every character'.

Agreed on all three points: that most systems don't talk about it; that Gygax obsesses about it; and that Traveller's system is state-of-the-art for the period (and frankly, remains state-of-the-art for any game that is going to track time in "real life" rather than dramatic units).

even D&D has structures in which this is NOT the assumption. To whit look at the 1e henchman acquisition rules, which allow the PCs to declare (and pay for) specific activities which are then assumed to play out over a period of time during which they are repeated (IE the PCs go to every bar and dive in the town and post messages or something similar for a week).

Good point. Which in my mind just reinforces the point I was making, that an action declaration we look for sect members at the teahouse doesn't generally bring with it any particular assumption about how long is spent on the endeavour, and certainly doesn't imply a quick look for 10 minutes then heading off elsewhere.

However, most other games, at that time or others, really didn't talk about time.

<snip>

This is a pretty common pattern for games in this time period. They may note some few specific situations where a time cost exists, but there isn't really a coherent concept in these games of time as a structured resource or some explicit way to manage it or use it dramatically (drama is rarely mentioned in these early games). It is generally just assumed that time is the purview of the GM and may come into play in whatever way he sees fit.

To me, at least, this connects to [MENTION=5142]Aldarc[/MENTION]'s recent post about system assumptions and the like: what we see in a lot of late-70s/early-to-mid-80s games is a "cargo cult"-like emulation of certain features of D&D without serious consideration of why one would emulate them. So eg we get healing times in games like CoC, RM, etc which ultimately are mere colour in play, because the passing of time has no cost except insofar as the GM decides otherwise. (RQ is an exception, because time not spent healing can be spent training; and BW builds fairly extensively on this idea, further adding in a systematic living cost/maintenance system.)

Our term for this is "rubber time". It usually happens when a party's in town for some downtime

<snip>

But in the field time is very important even when the mission itself isn't time-sensitive: spell or effect durations, resource consumption, time taken to recover from injury - all of these and a bunch of other things need to be somewhat carefully tracked. Never mind tracking a split party so I know who is where when.

There are so many assumptions here, from the distinction between "downtime" and "in the field", to the method used to manage separate groups.

For instance:

I'll work out how long the longest action will take, and once all the downtime stuff is figured out and resolved I'll say something like "Right. You've spent a month in town and all of you are now finished whatever you were doing

Here, time is just colour. There's no reason it can't be colour "in the field" also. (D&D pretends that it's not, by specifying spell durations. But as soon as one moves outside of a highly structure dungeon-crawl environment with very rigid movement rules, wandering monster clocks, etc -ie as soon as one moves into the 2nd ed AD&D era - then all the external moving parts are decided by the GM, which makes the players' choices about time mere colour.)

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

I agree AD&D has a lot of subsystems, many I suspect underused and underappreciated. To Spying as a means of information-gathering can be added sages (whose subsystem is hidden in the NPC hireling tables).

But many of the AD&D subsystems are quite clunky as written, and - at least in my experience with them, which is not extensive for some but is reasonably extensive for others - often quite clunky in play also. Part of the genius of Classic Traveller, in my view, is how playable it is for a sub-system heavy game.

Another part of its genius is its relative comprehensiveness - there is the procurement gap I mentioned, and over the past year or so I've often lamented that it's onworld exploration rules are pretty terrible, but it covers a lot of stuff in its 3 books. Relative to genre, it is (in my view) far more comprehensive than AD&D despite the latter's much greater page size and page count.

I think it would be much harder to play AD&D as DW-like than Classic Traveller. (Though if anyone has tried and succeeded, it would be interesting to hear about it!)

No, I never have played AD&D in that fashion... 2e at least has SOME of the sorts of mechanics you'd need, but for 1e you'd have to rely on DSG/WSG/OA subsystems.

Traveler is pretty easy in the sense that you can simply rely on its basic check mechanism, which is as comprehensive and straightforward as anything in existence. You could simply ignore most of the subsystems in favor of a DW-esque 'make a move' sort of concept where each skill is engaged by one or more such rules. I'm sure it wouldn't be too hard to basically reinterpret DW's moves into Traveler context either, and then just apply most apt skill/ability. It would be a little bit different game, but not vastly in genre terms.

 

[Manbearcat]

Great post above [MENTION=42582]pemerton[/MENTION] .

I just wanted to drill down even harder on the point you made above that hooks into the point that has been expressed in many different ways by other posters in this thread ("system matters").

1) Cortex+ Heroic Fantasy, Strike (!) and Dungeon World both share a LOT in common with 4e. However, if you play any one of those 4 games and expect somehow the totality of the experience of either of the other 3 games is going to emerge from your RPGing (or...you're going to be able to impose/force it), you're going to be seriously disappointed.

2) Torchbearer shares a LOT in common with Burning Wheel and Moldvay Basic. However, if you try to actually derive Burning Wheel or Moldvay Basic play from Torchbearer, you're going to be seriously disappointed.

3) Finally, a more broad-use RPG like Savage Worlds certainly isn't going to be able to reproduce the holistic, yet focused experience of any of those 7 games above.


I'm not going to write another essay on it again, but this hooks into my premise from a bit ago about integrated, holistic, yet focused games and discretized games that decouple theme/premise from system (yielding agnostic machinery) and substitute GM oversight/quality control for integrated and focused design.

 

[Manbearcat]

No, I never have played AD&D in that fashion... 2e at least has SOME of the sorts of mechanics you'd need, but for 1e you'd have to rely on DSG/WSG/OA subsystems.

Traveler is pretty easy in the sense that you can simply rely on its basic check mechanism, which is as comprehensive and straightforward as anything in existence. You could simply ignore most of the subsystems in favor of a DW-esque 'make a move' sort of concept where each skill is engaged by one or more such rules. I'm sure it wouldn't be too hard to basically reinterpret DW's moves into Traveler context either, and then just apply most apt skill/ability. It would be a little bit different game, but not vastly in genre terms.

There are a few Travelleresque hacks for PBtA and, while I have yet to play any, I've read them through and they seem to be inspired efforts.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

But that assumes a very binary set of possibilities: they are at the tea house, they are not at the tea house. All kinds of complications can arise in between. And I think a good GM will make sure that there are meaningful choices on the table. The very act of going around town asking about Bone Breaking Sect, might even trigger the sect to take an interest in the party. There could be real consequences for not finding them quickly. People might lie (sure I know where to find them, let me take you there). The GM knows, and the players don't, is useful for this kind of play. Not saying you can't do it another way. And I am not saying the other way is any kind of bad. I just think folks should genuinely try to understand why some of us might also enjoy this particular approach (because I can honestly tell you, it isn't because we like mother may I, or want to suffer under a GM who says 'no' all the time). So the conversation starts to feel very frustrating when we say, 'but we like it because X' and the response seems to be 'No you like it because Y and you refuse to see that A is a much better way to play the game'.

That's fine, I don't think there's a problem here. I didn't delve into all the possible scenarios that could exist because I was merely talking about how to approach satisfying a particular request by the players to go in a direction.

This ties into the later SYORTD discussion. The GM could simply 'say yes' and have the PCs run into the sect in the tea house, and this is valid. He could also RTD and thus potentially thwart the INTENT of the PCs in going to the tea house. This could result in most any of the complications and plot diversions which you have outlined.

My point was simply that it wouldn't make sense to introduce the tea house as a place to find the sect unless it was going to be dramatically interesting to do so. The actual place of the tea house in the eventual playing out (to see what happens) of the scenario is unknown until things HAVE played out. At least that is my way.

 

[Lanefan]

There are so many assumptions here, from the distinction between "downtime" and "in the field", to the method used to manage separate groups.

How would you manage separate groups, then, in such a way as to be able to determine when and where they might (or might not) meet - and without one group knowing what the other was doing or where they were?

For example - I'd say hypothetical but this actually happened last year in my game. How would you handle:

A party of ten characters is in a large dungeon complex and an effect teleports each character to a random place in the dungeon. None of the characters know where any of the others are; some recognize their new locations and some do not, and some of the locations arrived at already have other (hostile) occupants. One character has scrying capability, another has "Locate Object" as a spell, and two have long-range communication but only with each other. What do you-as-DM do now?

Here, time is just colour. There's no reason it can't be colour "in the field" also. (D&D pretends that it's not, by specifying spell durations. But as soon as one moves outside of a highly structure dungeon-crawl environment with very rigid movement rules, wandering monster clocks, etc -ie as soon as one moves into the 2nd ed AD&D era - then all the external moving parts are decided by the GM, which makes the players' choices about time mere colour.)

Even 2e had spell durations, and knowing when to get to the ground before your Fly spell ran out was still rather important.

And though you like to categorize it thus, there's lots more to 1e than straight dungeon-crawling. Wilderness adventures, city adventures, open-field (or open-plane) adventuring, and so forth; the game supports all of these and itme is important in all of 'em. Even something as simple as managing your water resources while crossing a desert or food while sailing across a sea still has a time factor attached.

 

[pemerton]

Even 2e had spell durations, and knowing when to get to the ground before your Fly spell ran out was still rather important.

My point is that it's all just colour plus GM-fiat. For instance (and using 1st ed AD&D rules, as they're the ones I know best): I'm walking through the town, and cast my fly spell so that I can fly to the barn of a farm outside a neighbouring village in time to intercept the cultists who are going to hold a ritual there. Let's suppose I'm a 5th level MU, so my Fly lasts 1 hour plus 0 to 50 minutes (in 10 minute blocks).

The speed of my flight is 12", and according to the DMG (p 30) every 3" is 1 mph, so I am flying at 4 mph, and can potentially cover 7+ miles with my spell.

What time is it when I cast my spell? How far away, exactly, is the barn from the farmhouse from the village from that part of the town I'm in when I cast? What time are the cultists holding their ritual? Will it all work out, will I be early, will I be late, will I crash? There's no mechanic for answering these questions, in the absence of a very atypically detailed map drawn up by the GM in advance.

This is what I mean when I say that time is not a mechanic. It's just something for the GM to think about. Of course, we can use the spell duration rule to inform a new mechanic: eg roll 4+ on 1d6 to make it there within the hour, meaning that we treat the die roll as settling questions like exactly how far is the barn from where I cast the spell in town? But D&D doesn't come with any such mechanics baked in. (Contrast Classic Traveller, which does - so it's not like the idea was completely alien in the early days of RPG design.)

How would you manage separate groups, then, in such a way as to be able to determine when and where they might (or might not) meet - and without one group knowing what the other was doing or where they were?

Perhaps the same way you do it during "downtime" - an intuitive synthesis of convenience and dramatic necessity.

Or perhaps using the rule in Cortex+ Heroic which allows the GM to spend a die from the Doom Pool to split or to rejoin the PCs.

Or maybe the players make a check to rejoin the party, with appropriate modifiers applying eg for having access to Locate Object-type magic.

There are many possibilities that don't rely on a wargame-style combination of detailed maps, movement rate rules and tracking time, which is what one would use for this situation in classic D&D.

 

[Sadras]

@pemerton everything can be colour including combat but the game provides

A means to measure the length of combat;
A means to measure duration of spell effect;
A means to measure distance travelled in a minute, hour, day;
A means to measure distance travelled via beast, vehicle or vessel in a hour or day;
A means to measure natural healing per day;
A means to measure the time taken to construct a building;
...and much much more
All of this is baked into the system. You can use it as a DM or you may not.

So yes it CAN be colour, but it does not necessarily have to.

In my games time plays a large factor.
So PC choice of action and time taken to complete actions affect play in a large way. That is NOT colour. And the reason I can use time, is because the system provides for that measurement should one wish to use it.

 

[Ovinomancer]

@pemerton everything can be colour including combat but the game provides

A means to measure the length of combat;
A means to measure duration of spell effect;
A means to measure distance travelled in a minute, hour, day;
A means to measure distance travelled via beast, vehicle or vessel in a hour or day;
A means to measure natural healing per day;
A means to measure the time taken to construct a building;
...and much much more
All of this is baked into the system. You can use it as a DM or you may not.

So yes it CAN be colour, but it does not necessarily have to.

In my games time plays a large factor.
So PC choice of action and time taken to complete actions affect play in a large way. That is NOT colour. And the reason I can use time, is because the system provides for that measurement should one wish to use it.

Okay, then answer the barn question [MENTION=42582]pemerton[/MENTION] poses: how far/long to the barn?

I agree with you that "just color" is a bit hyperbolic, but tge underlying point that time is either an undefined or very poorly defined mechanic is true. That doesn't mean that you, a GM, can't further refine or emphasize this but it does mean you're adding definition to your game to do so. This is apparent because the next GM over doesn't have to focus on time and is still running the same set of mechanics.

To reiterate: time is mostly a GM choice, not a well defined mechanic.

 

[pemerton]

the game provides

A means to measure the length of combat;
A means to measure duration of spell effect;
A means to measure distance travelled in a minute, hour, day;
A means to measure distance travelled via beast, vehicle or vessel in a hour or day;
A means to measure natural healing per day;
A means to measure the time taken to construct a building;
...and much much more
All of this is baked into the system. You can use it as a DM or you may not.

As far as movement is concerned, which was the example I gave, the only system in AD&D for determining how long it takes to get from A to B is to have a map, to which movement rates are applied. I've never encountered a GM or a supplement that has the requisite maps to apply a fly spell when the movement is overland at 4 mph. That's 2/3 of a mile per 10-minute turn, or approx 1 km. One of the more detailed maps I have is the one that came with my GH boxed set, and has various villages, hamlets, farmlets etc in the vicinity of GH marked. But it doesn't give the location of all these things to that sort of accuracy.

And here's another example: if the players have their PCs spend X weeks resting, or researching spells, or whatver, then their enemies can presumalby recruit Y new recruits. What is the value of Y? I don't know of any D&D rule that answers that question. (Traveller does have such a rule, in the Mercenary supplement. Whether that makes the game more or less realistic I'll leave as a judgement for others.)

Suppose X = 2 weeks: the GM can decide that the enemies get a sudden burst of recruits in that time. Suppose X = 10 weeks: the GM can decide that the recruitement pool is dry and the enemies get no more powerful.

Luke Crane's Adventure Burner discusses this issue, but because BW is no different from D&D in this particular respect all he has to offer is that the longer the player spend in "downtime", the more liberty the GM has to change the situation adversely without unfairly hosing the players - and he also gives a worked example of growing a nemesis NPC in accordance with the training rules that govern PCs.

This is what I mean when I say that time is colour. It suggests various possibilities to the GM, but it doesn't actually generate action resolution outcomes.

It's also interesting to notice that the 5e design team seem to have noticed this, and thus to have changed most spell durations to allow their in-game time to serve as narrative time without needing too much hand-waving: 1 minute = 1 combat, 10 minutes = 1 room/corridor's worth of exploration, 1 hour = 1 level/modern dungeon's worth of exploration, 8 hour = a day's active time.