A Question Of Agency?

[Fenris-77]

A PC can actually author an obstacle in HotB. In the second example I gave, to add some detail, the PC enters a dark room and asks the GM is there anyone in here? The PC rolls essentially a perception check plus wagers and the result is him getting to add the assassin and details. HotB is a pretty singular example though.

 

[FrogReaver]

Sure, what people will like is pretty subjective, of course.

I don’t think that being able to author what’s in the next room of a dungeon is the same as the other examples, though, because it’s the players setting up their own challenge.

That's progress!

I can agree that sounds like a rather large difference. Would you say it's not typical for narrative style games to give players the ability to author their own obstacles?

What about the ability to author the removal of an obstacle?

What about the ability to author a detail about an obstacle/scene that changes the nature or difficulty of an obstacle (say by narrating some NPC or faction is also present in the scene and is willing to assist with overcoming the obstacle)?

 

[Crimson Longinus]

@Manbearcat

I have played a lot of 4e, and GMed it a bit. And I don't hate it. It was certainly better than incoherent messes that were the previous editions. But it has certain design assumptions that rub me the wrong way and I was hardly alone in that. (Though I think a lot of that could have been at least somewhat alleviated with a differnt presentation.)

Forget the antimanic field. I have never used an antimanic field and I don't remember ever encountering one in any edition. (Though it probably has happened. It seems that I am far worse at remembering details of games that took place a long time ago than many other people here.) But in any edition the GM can introduce elements that screw the characters over. You seem to think that it is 5e's fault that the mechanics allow super unfun 'disadvantage to everything and everything has magic resistance' to exist. That's just silly. Every edition also allows infinite tarrasques to exist, doesn't mean it is the game's fault if the GM does this. A lot of your talk about the GM force seems to relate to similar idea too: that the game should stop the GM from doing the things you don't want the GM to do or that you don't want to do as a GM. Well, it's not the system's job to do that, this is a people issue.

As for DCs and such, I'm not gonna unpack my dusty 4e books. My recollection was that the initial presentation was really muddy, and certainly lead to many people assuming that the DCs should literally scale instead of just the opposition scaling which then lead to the DCs scaling. Introduction of things like minions, which meant that a literal same creature could have differnt rules depending of the level of the PC it was fighting reinforced this image. I think the tried to clarify it in some later books. And regardless of how you do it, too much 'level appropriateness' is a bad idea. It leads to the situation that happens in MMOs: the numbers get bigger, but nothing really changes. At least in theory I really like the 5e bounded accuracy concept, which actually keeps the low level enemies relevant longer (without awkward hacks like the minions) and lets you actually feel that you're getting more powerful.

As for subjectiveness of DCs, I'd love if there was more concrete example in 5e to set the baseline more solidly. You of course cannot cover all situations, but once you have a good amount of examples the rest gets easier to extrapolate consistently. However, ultimately it doesn't matter whether you, me and @Lanefan would all assign a different DC to a task X, all that matters is that the DC assignment remains consistent within one campaign. I really think this is important, and some GMs overlook this and just assign DCs randomly; that's a bad practice; you need to have a consistent framework. And of course one could intentionally use different frameworks for differnt campaigns to promote differnt genre. If I wanted a rather down to earth, gritty campaign, I would probably assign crazy acrobatic stunts higher DCs than if I was aiming for more anime/wuxia inspired feel.

 

[Campbell]

That's progress!

I can agree that sounds like a rather large difference. Would you say it's not typical for narrative style games to give players the ability to author their own obstacles?

What about the ability to author the removal of an obstacle?

What about the ability to author a detail about an obstacle/scene that changes the nature or difficulty of an obstacle (say by narrating some NPC or faction is also present in the scene and is willing to assist with overcoming the obstacle)?

Not sure by what you mean by narrative games, but I am fan of Narrativist or Story Now games. Games that are fundamentally about characters' personal struggles and that have something to say about human relationships. Examples include Sorcerer, Burning Wheel, Torchbearer, Dream Askew, Voidheart Symphony, Dogs in the Vineyard, Apocalypse World, Cartel, Masks, The Veil and Monsterhearts.

I am also a fan of more mainstream games that cover similar spaces. Examples include Vampire - The Masquerade Fifth Edition, Vampire - The Requiem Second Edition, Demon - The Descent, Changeling - The Lost Second Edition, Werewolf - The Forsaken Second Edition, Exalted Third Edition, Scion Second Edition, and Legend of the Five Rings Fifth Edition.

Of these games that I like playing/running for more character focused faire only Scion has dramatic editing. Exalted and Burning Wheel allow players to define setting details through knowledge checks. Demon The Descent features reality altering abilities, but that's in the fiction. It's what rogue angels of the God Machine do.

The rest pretty much lack any sort of ability to change the fiction except through actions declared by the player for their PC.

They all pretty much feature binding rules that interact on the psychosocial landscape. Most of the conflicts in these games center on deeply personal stuff so I find it helps give those conflicts weight if we have mechanisms that can help the players experience what their characters are going through.

 

[hawkeyefan]

@Bedrockgames thanks for the detailed response. I think I am familiar with this kind of open sandbox approach that you’ve described.

I have a few questions in the interest of discussion.

For the Ogre Gate Inn campaign, how did you handle when things shifted to a generational approach? Like, how were brides/husbands found and courted, and so on?

For the 87 Killers campaign, do you think having a strong central theme helped focus the players? Like that core idea gave them the framework to craft goals and desires and so on? Was it an obstacle for any player?

Finally, with the 20 year history campaign with Saffron Tigress etc, do you think that your introduction of this secret heroine of an older era being discovered is what caused the shift in the campaign? What was your intention or expectation of introducing this element? Do you think it’s that surprising that the players would take this story idea and run with it?

 

[Ovinomancer]

You've been involved in the parts of the conversation where I've plainly stated I don't play those kinds of games. So I'm going to chalk it up as you forgetting. This has been a very long discussion afterall.

Heck, you even agree with my assessment on this despite my lack of first hand experience as evidenced by your expressed agreement with that very notion in your recent posts with @Bedrockgames. I think you even mentioned that examples of this were given by others in one of your recent posts.

EDIT: Wanted to add. I am a bit sensitive to bringing up lack of firsthand knowledge, as others have attempted to use that fallacy to shut down my thoughts and opinions on the subject. So while I think you are reasonable and rational and wouldn't do that, it did kind of come across that way to me initially.

When you make proclamations about how play you don't do works, there's a reasonable ask for you to show your work. You've repeated insisted that your opinions are well founded, and yet anyone with actual experience sees they're foundationless bloviating. If you're going to continue to insist on saying how other games work then it's very reasonable to call you out on this and ask for an example -- since you think you can accurately present play you should be able to form an example, yes? One would imagine that you have no interest in learning or understanding anything about the topic.

I mean, the reverse to your approach would be to say that D&D is nothing more than a Mother-May-I game, where participants are granted the leeway to pantomime whatever fits with the GM's direction of the game. That the players are little more than actors, following the script and direction of the GM in play. I, however, have actually played D&D, and know this is a bad example -- it's a caricature full of hyperbole and a bit of outright misrepresentation of the game; it's a description of a degenerate version of play. So, I don't. But, you have no problem doing this exact thing -- caricature and hyperbole of degenerate play of other games-- because you lack any actual understanding or experience of those game. The real difference is that I also once thought the things you thought (not that I didn't need knowledge, that part's unique to you), but I actually went and learned something rather than yell into the wind.

 

[pemerton]

A PC can actually author an obstacle in HotB.

PC or player?

 

[hawkeyefan]

I think he knows good and well that I haven't played your kind of games. I don't think @hawkeyefan would ask for something he knows I can't provide.

I had a feeling that may be the case, but I wasn’t sure.

Heck, you even agree with my assessment on this despite my lack of first hand experience as evidenced by your expressed agreement with that very notion in your recent posts with @Bedrockgames. I think you even mentioned that examples of this were given by others in one of your recent posts.

What do you mean here? That examples of rules were offered?

EDIT: Wanted to add. I am a bit sensitive to bringing up lack of firsthand knowledge, as others have attempted to use that fallacy to shut down my thoughts and opinions on the subject. So while I think you are reasonable and rational and wouldn't do that, it did kind of come across that way to me initially.

What fallacy? I’m not going to try and shut you down from having whatever opinion you’d like. However, I do think that lack of experience can absolutely play a factor in one’s understanding of a topic.

I’m not going to assume that you or I understand Burning Wheel as much as @pemerton does, for example. I’ve read some of it, but not thoroughly. Why would I assume I know as much about that game as him?

Doesn’t mean I can’t have an opinion about the game. But when it comes to how it works and what its strengths and weaknesses may be, I’d expect him to have a better handle on it.

That's progress!

I can agree that sounds like a rather large difference. Would you say it's not typical for narrative style games to give players the ability to author their own obstacles?

It’s not something I have had a ton of familiarity with. I’ve certainly played games where players will put forth things that they want for their characters to struggle with and for the GM to bring forth in the game. But that’s a bit different.

To actually intro an obstacle, like the assassin in @Fenris-77 ‘s example from Houses of the Blooded, is something I have much less experience with. I’m sure it could be intetesting, but I expect how it is resolved would be the big question, as well as how it’s introduced and so on.

What about the ability to author the removal of an obstacle?

Sure, I think this is the common way RPGs work.

What about the ability to author a detail about an obstacle/scene that changes the nature or difficulty of an obstacle (say by narrating some NPC or faction is also present in the scene and is willing to assist with overcoming the obstacle)?

I’m open to this idea, for sure. It comes up in Blades in the Dark when players are free to add details as part of Action declaration, but that’s pretty minor. It can certainly come up in a Flashback, which gives the players a lot of leeway to bring things into the fiction, but there are costs and they do need to fit with what’s already been established.

For example, in my first Blades in the Dark campaign, the PCs were infiltrating a property that belonged to a rival faction. Things went pretty poorly for them with some low rolls, and ultimately they were confronted by a group of four armed guards. The player of the Slide (a Face-type character) called for a Flashback. The night before the score, he spent some time in a tavern where guards for this faction were known to hang out. He spent a Coin to persuade some guards to help them out, with the promise of no blowback. I advised him this Flashback would cost 2 Stress, which he happily paid.

Even with the Coin, this required a roll. The player said it was going to be a Sway roll, which makes sense. I set the Position/Effect at Desperate/Standard; I figured even with the Coin, the Slide was putting the crew in a potentially vulnerable position. These guys could simply take the coin and promise to help and then turn on them in the moment. Or worse, they could alert the whole place and have everyone ready to pounce on the PCs.

So a lot was riding on this roll. The Slide player decided to push to add an extra die to his Sway pool, for a total of 3 dice. This brought the total cost of this Flashback up to 4 Stress and 1 Coin, which is significant.

He rolls....double 6s for a critical.

So the guards don’t just ignore them and let them go about their business, they say to let them know if they can be of any help in the future. They have no love for their boss (a labor boss who squeezes all he can from his workers and destroys any attempt to unionize).

So the player of the Slide no only narrated the crew out of a threat with their Flashback, but due to the crit also made a contact for potential use in the future.

 

[Fenris-77]

PC or player?

Sorry, player, via the task resolution mechanics. PC would be weird.

 

[prabe]

Sorry, player, via the task resolution mechanics. PC would be weird.

Well, sometimes PCs do create problems for themselves, but that's not really what we're talking about here. ;-)