D&D General No Fixed Location -- dynamically rearranging items, monsters, and other game elements in the interests of storytelling

[Monayuris]

So before this devolves into quibbling back and forth -

The DM can run the game 2 ways (maybe more but those don't seem relevant for this discussion).

1. The only fiction that is "real" is the players
2. Fiction can be established independently of players

Here's the deal though, the only person that is able to get any satisfaction of a DM independently establishing fiction is the DM himself. The players won't know it. To them the only "true" fiction is what you relay to them in game.

That's not always true.

In my megadungeon campaign, there are tons of secret sub-levels, treasure rooms, teleporters, hidden stairs that have simply never been found. They exist independently of the players. They have not been found simple because the players have chosen not to explore in that direction, or interact with a particular room or thing.

I don't hint at any of this and I don't 'move' these things to areas they do explore. I don't care if they find them or not. It is on them to make the choices to take the effort to find them and when they do so, they get the satisfaction of discovering something new and the reward therein.

If they discover these things they do so because of what there own action, not because I deem that they should.

 

[prabe]

If you want to move something, and the party hasn't made a choice either to seek it out or to avoid it, it doesn't seem to me as though you're doing any harm; it doesn't seem particularly different from something rolled on a table. The issues come about, I think, when the party makes a choice that is then obviated, such as if they try to avoid something and you move it in front of them (because you think it will be an awesomefun encounter) or when they go looking for something and you move it to where they aren't going (because you think they need to find something else to make sense of what they're looking for, or you think they need more experience, or whatever).

 

[TwoSix]

That's not always true.

In my megadungeon campaign, there are tons of secret sub-levels, treasure rooms, teleporters, hidden stairs that have simply never been found. They exist independently of the players. They have not been found simple because the players have chosen not to explore in that direction, or interact with a particular room or thing.

I don't hint at any of this and I don't 'move' these things to areas they do explore. I don't care if they find them or not. It is on them to make the choices to take the effort to find them and when they do so, they get the satisfaction of discovering something new and the reward therein.

If they discover these things they do so because of what there own action, not because I deem that they should.

But that's just proving @FrogReaver's point. The only person who knows you placed stuff there and didn't move it is you, the DM. You may derive some satisfaction from that, and maybe they appreciate that you maintain consistency if you tell them, but the actual process is entirely opaque to them. They have no way to appreciate, as a game process, that you're maintaining consistency.

 

[Seramus]

Here's the deal though, the only person that is able to get any satisfaction of a DM independently establishing fiction is the DM himself. The players won't know it. To them the only "true" fiction is what you relay to them in game.

Some players get satisfaction that there is independent fiction, and their enjoyment can be (in extreme cases) entirely destroyed without it. Granted, a DM could always lie about it.

 

[prabe]

Some players get satisfaction that there is independent fiction, and their enjoyment can be (in extreme cases) entirely destroyed without it. Granted, a DM could always lie about it.

I think there's a case to be made that the characters should experience an independent world, but how much the GM is moving around behind the curtain is ... a different question, on some level. I try to have things happen in the world in places the PCs aren't, but keeping track of the time there is ... a thing.

 

[Oofta]

Some players get satisfaction that there is independent fiction, and their enjoyment can be (in extreme cases) entirely destroyed without it. Granted, a DM could always lie about it.

Huh? How can their enjoyment be destroyed that they never discovered something they never knew existed in the first place?

Unless the DM tells them "if you had turned left you would have won the game", they can't know what they missed. If the DM does tell them what they missed, IMHO that's bad DMing.

Player choices should matter, but those choices should be based on something other than random chance. The outcome may be determined by chance and a roll of the die, but that's different.

On the other hand, yes the world goes on outside of the players in spite of, or sometimes as an indirect consequence of their actions or inaction.

 

[Monayuris]

But that's just proving @FrogReaver's point. The only person who knows you placed stuff there and didn't move it is you, the DM. You may derive some satisfaction from that, and maybe they appreciate that you maintain consistency if you tell them, but the actual process is entirely opaque to them. They have no way to appreciate, as a game process, that you're maintaining consistency.

They will appreciate it when they decide to check those areas and discover something interesting.

If there is a statue that has a secret compartment to a treasure room and they ignore it for months. If one day they decide to check the statue out and find the treasure, they would have found the treasure based on their decision to do so. It was their action that resulted in finding it.

 

[HarbingerX]

So before this devolves into quibbling back and forth -

The DM can run the game 2 ways (maybe more but those don't seem relevant for this discussion).

1. The only fiction that is "real" is the players
2. Fiction can be established independently of players

Here's the deal though, the only person that is able to get any satisfaction of a DM independently establishing fiction is the DM himself. The players won't know it. To them the only "true" fiction is what you relay to them in game.

I'm in total agreement with this summary. The DM satisfaction isn't really the point for 2 it's that it serves as backdrop which leads to things the players can potential find. I guess it's more important when you're talking about a campaign setting that runs for years with many story arcs running inside it over time, as opposed to a single campaign arc like the paizo adventure paths.

 

[Charlaquin]

But that's just proving @FrogReaver's point. The only person who knows you placed stuff there and didn't move it is you, the DM. You may derive some satisfaction from that, and maybe they appreciate that you maintain consistency if you tell them, but the actual process is entirely opaque to them. They have no way to appreciate, as a game process, that you're maintaining consistency.

I think it depends on how that stuff is set up, really. If it’s just hidden stuff the players will never know exists if they don’t happen to ask to check for secret doors in the right place or whatever, then I agree, only the DM gets any satisfaction from that. But, if it’s intentionally placed based on in-fiction logic, and there are environmental cues that point towards its existence, then I think it can enrich the players’ experience.

Take, for example, the classic hidden room indicated by the space it fills being blank on the map. Obviously that only works in an old-school dungeon crawl where the players map every room in detail, but it’s a very easy to grokk example of what I’m talking about. That’s something potentially highly satisfying for the players to find - their attention to detail and diligence in mapping paid off by revealing to them something cool they wouldn’t have otherwise found, and that feels good. It triggers the reward centers of your brain and gives you that sweet dopamine hit. But it would not be satisfying if the DM just moved that hidden room because the players didn’t find it. There’d be a blank space on the map for no reason, and whatever secrets are in the room would just be more loot instead of a special reward for the players’ diligence.

Granted, if the players have no idea they missed anything, they obviously don’t get anything out of it. But I would argue that a DM who is hiding things in such a way that players are likely to have no idea they missed them is... I don’t want to say “doing it wrong,” but they’re putting in a lot of effort that is unlikely to have any payoff. On the other hand, if the players can tell they missed something but can’t figure out what, or they make the decision that the potential reward isn’t worth the risk of taking the time to find it, that’s still valuable. That’s still enriching their experience.

This is why I am a strong advocate of telegraphing hidden elements and ensuring that actions have costs and/or consequences. Sometimes players will pick up on the telegraph, sometimes they won’t. Sometimes they’ll pick up on it but decide the cost of following up on it isn’t worth it, sometimes they’ll burn resources in pursuit of the telegraphed secret. All of these are outcomes that enrich the player experience, in my opinion, except maybe when they don’t pick up on the telegraph, and that risk is in my opinion well worth it for all that the other possibilities add to the game.

 

[HarbingerX]

Aside 1 to this conversation.

The ultimate example I've seen of hidden adventure was the WG4 module. The PCs could find a gnome settlement and be asked to deal with raids from some hobgoblins and ogres whom they find occupying an old abandoned template. The players could just deal with the tactical challenge posed by the monsters, wipe them out and then move on. But more curious players who spend more time looking for secrets in the temple can uncover an entire other much more important adventure.

Reading this adventure when I was young I was really troubled by the thought that my players could just pass through and miss all that. But I now appreciate that in the context of a long running campaign setting, it's ok because it's all the better when much later a different group of PCs revisits the location and find it, or the PCs find a series of clues to point them to going back and taking another look.