D&D 5E player knowlege vs character knowlege (spoiler)

[Maxperson]

On the one hand, this raises the question of what "reality" is in a game world (as per my comment up thread). Does that reality exist independently of what has been experienced by the adventurers? Does the DM actually control every aspect of it? After all, if a werewolf suddenly exists in that world, it came from..."somewhere". Right?

Yes it exists independently. Yes the DM controls every aspect that that are not the PCs. And yes if the werewolf exists, it came from somewhere. Those are the defaults anyway. The DM can alter any or all of those if he wishes.

On the other hand, werewolves don't exist in our world, either, and yet somehow even non-gamers know that you need silver weapons to kill them.

It's not a "somehow." The answer is Hollywood. Without all those werewolf movies, the percentage of non-gamers aware that silver is needed would be very close to 0. The game world likely doesn't have Hollywood or the equivalent to educate the masses.

This recurring debate about playstyle, and the insistence of the anti-metagamers that we are not only doing it wrong, but "cheating", keeps making me think of the movie, "Lords of Dogtown".

Only a very few call it cheating in general. Most of us label it cheating for our game and acknowledge that if you the DM allow it, it cannot be cheating.\

 

[Guest 6801328]

As an Elf, why wouldnt they assume she's a Balenorn (Good aligned Elven Lich)?

How would they even know such a thing existed? Sounds like player knowledge to me.

 

[Guest 6801328]

It's not a "somehow." The answer is Hollywood. Without all those werewolf movies, the percentage of non-gamers aware that silver is needed would be very close to 0. The game world likely doesn't have Hollywood or the equivalent to educate the masses.

Werewolf legends have been around for centuries, and it's not like before Hollywood people weren't interested in stories. (I hear some poem called "The Iliad" or something like that was popular once upon a time.)

I honestly don't know if Hollywood invented the silver thing or not (I doubt it) but let's say you're right and that before the film era "the percentage of non-gamers aware that silver is needed would be very close to 0". Fine. Maybe my PC is one of them?

 

[Maxperson]

Werewolf legends have been around for centuries, and it's not like before Hollywood people weren't interested in stories. (I hear some poem called "The Iliad" or something like that was popular once upon a time.)

Sure. But not American ones and not really during the modern era. Hollywood made it common knowledge.

I honestly don't know if Hollywood invented the silver thing or not, but let's say you're right and that before that era "the percentage of non-gamers aware that silver is needed would be very close to 0". Fine. Maybe my PC is one of them?

I don't think they invented it, but they definitely got it to the masses.

As for "Maybe my PC is one of them?", I agree. That's what the dice, world setting and/or background are for. If the setting has no lycnanthropes at all and a werewolf got sent to the setting by planar travel, your PC would have 0 chance of knowing and the DM should just deny. I've never heard of a setting like that, but I'm sure someone homebrewed one at some point. If they exist in the world, but there's no special reason why your PC would know outright, you should get a roll. If your PC lived next to the werewolf woods and your people dealt with them all the time, the DM should just give it to you without a roll.

 

[Charlaquin]

The characters dont. The players do.

No, the players know she’s a lich (unless the DM changed that detail or used the name for another character entirely, so technically they don’t know, but they have a pretty good guess). The characters suspect she might be a lich. They might or might not have any reason to do so. Again, people have suspicions without reason all the time, so this is not an unrealistic thing for the characters to do.

Why would they try and kill her?

Because they think she’s a lich, obviously.

They're Good aligned. She isnt harming them, has no intent on harming them, and divine sense doesnt reveal alignment (not that this matters).

Why just murder her? How is that 'good'?

Because they think she’s a lich, and liches are obligate soul-eaters. They also know she’s undead, and undead are an affront against them natural order of the cosmos.

As an Elf, why wouldnt they assume she's a Balenorn (Good aligned Elven Lich)?

It’s possible they don’t know about Balenorns. That’s up to the players to decide.

 

[Guest 6801328]

As for "Maybe my PC is one of them?", I agree. That's what the dice, world setting and/or background are for. If the setting has no lycnanthropes at all and a werewolf got sent to the setting by planar travel, your PC would have 0 chance of knowing and the DM should just deny. I've never heard of a setting like that, but I'm sure someone homebrewed one at some point. If they exist in the world, but there's no special reason why your PC would know outright, you should get a roll. If your PC lived next to the werewolf woods and your people dealt with them all the time, the DM should just give it to you without a roll.

You state that as if it's factual, but it's an opinion. And it is a valid opinion, I'll give it that, but it really is just one way to play.

Another way to play is to just let the players decide what they want their characters to know. Traditionalists use a bogeyman argument to invalidate this playstyle: they say that unscrupulous players will use out-of-game knowledge to their advantage. However:
a) In a "no player knowledge" game, unscrupulous players will do the same thing, they'll just keep it quiet.
b) And, um, don't play with jerks?

Again, it's totally valid to want to play in a way that strictly separates player knowledge from character knowledge. I don't personally enjoy doing that, but if you do, cool. However there's no actual, functional, practical reason why that approach works better. It's not "better roleplaying" or "real roleplaying". It's a kind of roleplaying. It's just something that some gamers enjoy. AND it adds unnecessary complexity to the game: it requires players to keep that distinction in mind. It adds dice rolls to see if characters "know" things. It forces the DM to remember what's secret and what isn't. It causes problems like the one the OP wrote about.

The fact that it's more traditional carries zero weight, in my opinion. Again, the skateboarding example. And I'm sure we could all come up with a thousand historical examples in hobbies, sports, professions, technologies, academic disciplines, trades, etc. where staunch (even unthinking) traditionalism has hobbled innovation.

 

[Charlaquin]

The player openly admits to making that assumption (she was a Lich) based on his OOC knowledge from reading the books.

He knows that her name is the same as a character from the books. He assumes, perhaps correctly, perhaps incorrectly, that she is the same character, and that the DM hasn’t changed any details about her. That’s the player knowledge side of the equation. The character does not know anything about this character, but suspects she might be a lich. He doesn’t have much reason to suspect this, but people often have unsubstantiated suspicions, so it is not an implausible character decision.

It wasnt just a lucky guess; he openly admits to using that knowledge, to formulate a plan and advise the other players at the table (including the Paladin) of that fact.

Using divine sense is a logical next step when you suspect someone of being undead but don’t have any evidence to back it up. Upon learning that she is indeed undead, plotting to kill her is maybe a reckless next step, but not an unreasonable one.

I dont care about hypotheticals. In this specific case the player openly admits his character only suspected her because of his own knowledge out of game.

That’s his decision to make. It’s not an unreasonable thing for his character to think, even lacking the knowledge the player has.

 

[Guest 6801328]

It’s possible they don’t know about Balenorns. That’s up to them to decide.

I have to admit I'm really curious why @Flamestrike thinks it's fine for players to know about Balenorns but not about Valindra. Their post was the first time I've even heard of such a thing as Balenorns.

It sounds like they have two categories in mind, "things adventurers would know" and "things adventurers would not know". But how do they decide what goes into which bucket?

And is it possible that not every adventurer would have identical buckets?

 

[Maxperson]

You state that as if it's factual, but it's an opinion. And it is a valid opinion, I'll give it that, but it really is just one way to play.

It's the default RAW way to play. Of course it's only one way, though. DMs can and are encouraged to make the game their own. That includes changing it so that it's not the DM's call on if you succeed fail or roll due to the outcome being in doubt.

Another way to play is to just let the players decide what they want their characters to know. Traditionalists use a bogeyman argument to invalidate this playstyle: they say that unscrupulous players will use out-of-game knowledge to their advantage. However:
a) In a "no player knowledge" game, unscrupulous players will do the same thing, they'll just keep it quiet.
b) And, um, don't play with jerks?

So first, how can they keep it quiet? It's not as if they can attack the werewolf with silver without the DM knowing. Second, if it's a no player knowledge game and the player is trying to sneak in player knowledge, he's the one being the jerk. And I agree, don't play with jerks.

Again, it's totally valid to want to play in a way that strictly separates player knowledge from character knowledge. I don't personally enjoy doing that, but if you do, cool. However there's no actual, functional, practical reason why that approach works better. It's not "better roleplaying" or "real roleplaying". It's a kind of roleplaying. It's just something that some gamers enjoy.

I agree that it's not better or worse inherently. Each method is only better or worse based on the preferences of those playing the game. I was just stating the 5e default for that situation.

AND it adds unnecessary complexity to the game: it requires players to keep that distinction in mind. It adds dice rolls to see if characters "know" things. It forces the DM to remember what's secret and what isn't. It causes problems like the one the OP wrote about.

Unnecessary, like the method itself, is in the eye of the beholder. It's quite necessary in my game. Also, I'm not forced to remember anything. If we come to a situation where a PC wants to know something about a monster, I look at the circumstances and make a decision on the spot. It only takes a few seconds as I know the world(Forgotten Realms), and the PCs.

 

[Guest 6801328]

It's the default RAW way to play. Of course it's only one way, though. DMs can and are encouraged to make the game their own. That includes changing it so that it's not the DM's call on if you succeed fail or roll due to the outcome being in doubt.

Could you cite where in 5e it's RAW?

So first, how can they keep it quiet? It's not as if they can attack the werewolf with silver without the DM knowing. Second, if it's a no player knowledge game and the player is trying to sneak in player knowledge, he's the one being the jerk. And I agree, don't play with jerks.

It's not that the jerk attacks the werewolf with silver without the DM knowing, it's that he "pretends" to discover it after another character fails to damage the wolf. Then it becomes a game of "Wait, I think you already knew that." "No, really, I just thought of it." Etc.

Yes, that's being a jerk (if the social contract of that game expressly forbids it.). But that's my point: both playstyles are vulnerable to jerks. Therefore neither side in this debate can rely on the jerk argument.

I agree that it's not better or worse inherently. Each method is only better or worse based on the preferences of those playing the game. I was just stating the 5e default for that situation.

Again, why is it the 5e default? (Not being snarky, I honestly don't know what the passage is.)

Unnecessary, like the method itself, is in the eye of the beholder. It's quite necessary in my game. Also, I'm not forced to remember anything. If we come to a situation where a PC wants to know something about a monster, I look at the circumstances and make a decision on the spot. It only takes a few seconds as I know the world(Forgotten Realms), and the PCs.

I meant "necessary" in an objective sense. If a group of players decide that they must always voice act when speaking aloud, that by definition is "necessary" at their table, but that does't make it necessary for the game to function well.

Also, maybe it's quick and easy for you because you know FR well, but as I think the OP's story illustrates, the "no player knowledge" approach causes problems if the players know more lore than the DM does, which effectively creates a barrier to entry for DMs. The "player knowledge is fine" approach doesn't have that problem.