If an NPC is telling the truth, what's the Insight DC to know they're telling the truth?

[pemerton]

How does failed check affect the structural integrity of a chandelier? I know it's just an example, but if my PC swings from it, I don't see how gracefully I swing from it affects anything. Anyway, minor point on an example.

Here, you are assuming that the narration of a failure must identify some causal process that links the PC's action to the unhappy outcome - here, the breaking chandelier.

That's not an assumption that obtains in "intent and task"/"fail forward" adjudication. (For an example in the context of D&D, see the example of a Skill Challenge in the 4e Rules Compendium - the final failure produces an uhappy outcome for the PCs, but it's not directly caused by any error/failure on the PCs' part.)

 

[Oofta]

Here, you are assuming that the narration of a failure must identify some causal process that links the PC's action to the unhappy outcome - here, the breaking chandelier.

That's not an assumption that obtains in "intent and task"/"fail forward" adjudication. (For an example in the context of D&D, see the example of a Skill Challenge in the 4e Rules Compendium - the final failure produces an uhappy outcome for the PCs, but it's not directly caused by any error/failure on the PCs' part.)

What I'm saying is that if I think it's reasonable that the PC could tell that the chandelier could fall, I will tell the player. If there's a question of whether I think the PC might notice I'll ask for a perception or investigation check. If there's no reason for the PC to think the chandelier will fall, I don't tell the player anything.

I try to make my decisions based on how I envision the campaign world working, not on game theory.

Which actually ties back to the OP. I don't think you can ever be 100% certain someone is lying or telling the truth just by watching them closely. Therefore, I don't care what the game says I'm going to adjudicate based on my understanding of the way the world works. I'm not going to give or withhold information the PC should not have even from a meta-game standpoint.

 

[5ekyu]

I would just say that for the whole "know what happens next" vs "not knowing" ... huh? I've never had a DM tell me exactly what was going to happen on every single failure. I mean sometimes it's obvious, if you fail your dexterity check to walk the tightrope you fall. But other times? Is my PC a psychic fortune teller?

In other words, I don't see how it plays in to the immersion and loose simulation of the games I play. I give my players the information I think their PCs would have, nothing more, nothing less. It may be obvious (or detectable) that the chandelier may not support your weight* or it may just look like your standard, ordinary chandelier. If it's not reasonable for the PC to know that the lighting fixture isn't able to support their weight, I'm not going to tell them.

*How does failed check affect the structural integrity of a chandelier? I know it's just an example, but if my PC swings from it, I don't see how gracefully I swing from it affects anything. Anyway, minor point on an example.

So it's not true in your campaigns that all traps are telegraphed? Radical!!! Heretic!!! Welcome.

 

[Oofta]

So it's not true in your campaigns that all traps are telegraphed? Radical!!! Heretic!!! Welcome.

Yeah, I know. What are my evil bad guys thinking? Hidden traps designed to harm people? SACRILEGE!

 

[iserith]

Conversely, classic "skilled play" and also many of the presentations in this thread of "goal and approach" are in what I've called the rationalist camp. For those who incline that way, the particular approach to resolution that I advocate is probably less appealing than it is to me.

I think trying to put people into boxes is problematic. I don't incline any particular way. I play every game differently, according to what suits those systems. I can jump from a D&D 4e game, to a D&D 5e game, to a Dungeon World game (or Marvel Heroic or whatever) at will, playing and running each of them differently. If playing in the rules doesn't produce a desirable experience, I just don't play that game anymore. I don't try to make it something it's not or play it as if it's some other game. I have too many other games I can pick up to waste my time fighting the system or changing it.

I think "I only like games with this particular method" is self-limiting and I think running most games the same way despite their differences is self-defeating (in the sense that many people end up creating issues at the table).

 

[Guest 6801328]

*How does failed check affect the structural integrity of a chandelier? I know it's just an example, but if my PC swings from it, I don't see how gracefully I swing from it affects anything. Anyway, minor point on an example.

Not a minor point: it reveals a fundamental difference between two points of view about the nature of what's "real" in the game world.

 

[Oofta]

Not a minor point: it reveals a fundamental difference between two points of view about the nature of what's "real" in the game world.

If I understand you,the fundamental difference is that I build my encounters based on how I see the world working. If the chandelier looks fragile or if the building is old with rotting beams it makes sense that the chandelier may not support someone's weight. The state of the building depends on the scene. Abandoned? Well maintained? Opulent but the residents are maintaining a facade they haven't been able to afford for a long time?

I run my games as being a simulation of a fantasy world with simplified rules used to emulate that reality. While I try to balance that with what will be fun and challenging for the group, I start from what makes sense in the wold. Encounters and obstacles are derived from that scene. Player knowledge is always based on PC knowledge.

You approach it as a game first, simulation second.

So if I've captured that correctly, yes we have fundamentally different approaches.

 

[Charlaquin]

I would just say that for the whole "know what happens next" vs "not knowing" ... huh? I've never had a DM tell me exactly what was going to happen on every single failure. I mean sometimes it's obvious, if you fail your dexterity check to walk the tightrope you fall. But other times? Is my PC a psychic fortune teller?

In other words, I don't see how it plays in to the immersion and loose simulation of the games I play. I give my players the information I think their PCs would have, nothing more, nothing less. It may be obvious (or detectable) that the chandelier may not support your weight* or it may just look like your standard, ordinary chandelier. If it's not reasonable for the PC to know that the lighting fixture isn't able to support their weight, I'm not going to tell them.

Here’s my thing, though. The only way it’s unreasonable for the PC to know that the lighting fixture isn’t able to support their weight is if the DM makes it so. If you don’t think the game is improved by ensuring that the players always know the consequences their actions could have going in, that’s fine, we can agree to disagree about that. But since you create the world “there’s no way the character could know that” carries an implicit “because I made it that way.”

*How does failed check affect the structural integrity of a chandelier? I know it's just an example, but if my PC swings from it, I don't see how gracefully I swing from it affects anything. Anyway, minor point on an example.

Yeah, I mean I wouldn’t have whether or not the chandelier falls be dependent on the result of the player’s check in D&D either. But some folks would, and I might in a system like Dumgeon World. It’s a difference of baseline assumptions about the roles of GMs, players, and the dice.

 

[iserith]

Yeah, I mean I wouldn’t have whether or not the chandelier falls be dependent on the result of the player’s check in D&D either. But some folks would, and I might in a system like Dumgeon World. It’s a difference of baseline assumptions about the roles of GMs, players, and the dice.

I might, as a form of progress combined with a setback, which is a standard adjudication option in D&D 5e.

My standard response to "I don't see how this could be..." in a game like D&D is "Hold my beer."

 

[Guest 6801328]

You approach it as a game first, simulation second.

I'm not sure simulation even ranks second for me. (Although, like everybody else, there are places where a lack of realism gets under my skin.)

But, yes, between those two things that's the order.

I just can't muster any outrage over, for example, martial abilities being 1/day. Why is it 1/day? Game balance. How do you 'explain' it? That was the only time that day that the hero could muster sufficient ferocity. Where's the problem?