Gatekeeping Part II: The OG (Original Gatekeeping)

[Fenris-77]

Oddly, I was reading Amber this morning in the quest for crunch ideas (how weird does that sound?).

 

[prabe]

"I've found that diceless mechanics and the rules-light, narrative-heavy games (such as FATE) which they've inspired don't work as well for me, because they put me in the position as a player of wanting my character to fail, and they seem to call for a GM to be less of a collaborator with the players, and in many ways force the players to be more competitive than cooperative. I'm curious how you fit such subjective mechanics into something like D&D, which still occasionally shows its wargame roots."

See, you stopped getting my part in the conversation anything like right by the second line.

 

[lowkey13]

*Deleted by user*

 

[generic]

Let it be said, before anything, else, that I hate Paladins, but I love and play Paladins often...

And, although I hate TOTM, it's great that others enjoy it and want to play using it!

 

[lowkey13]

*Deleted by user*

 

[DemoMonkey]

Are people playing FATE playing D&D?

If not, (given the argument above) why not?

 

[generic]

Are people playing FATE playing D&D?

If not, (given the argument above) why not?

Because they're playing FATE, not, y'know, D&D...

 

[lowkey13]

*Deleted by user*

 

[Fenris-77]

....woah!

I have incorporated a fair amount of Amber mechanics into my D&D games to streamline the process, but it's more for rule of thumb, decision-making, flow. Not sure I'd use it for crunch.

Well, crunch and whatever. Mechanics are fine, I love making and using them, but sometimes it's more about the narrative tools, or a combination of the two. For example, in a recent Blades in the Dark conversion to 5E the author connected inspiration dice with the ability to use BitD style flashbacks, which I thought was bloody brilliant. Anyway, that sort of thing, just trolling for inspiration. Amber and Burning Wheel have been my light reading for that lately.

 

[prabe]

Eh, that's fine. That's a conversation. I'll call your attention to what you wrote above:

If people talk about "playing D&D" and it turns out they're not using what is arguably the core mechanic of D&D (rolling dice), I'm probably going to feel as though they aren't, in fact, playing D&D.

You are entitled to your feelies, but things get, um, DICEY when you start telling people that "they aren't, in fact, playing D&D."

Hehe. Dicey.

Fair. They're playing a heavily-houseruled version, probably so heavily-houseruled that any conversation would focus on that. OTOH, my own games are heavily-houseruled, too, just in a different direction. I ... think, and I might argue, that my games are more recognizable as D&D to more people who play D&D as D&D. That doesn't mean that anyone is doing anything wrong.