D&D 5E D&D compared to Bespoke Genre TTRPGs

[Campbell]

What if I'm the GM and I want to find out what happens and not decide? What if I am a player and do not want the GM smoothing stuff out? There's all sorts of reasons for liking concrete rules that have nothing do with trust. One common one is a desire for consistency.

 

[Imaro]

Well of course you don't know how we communicate, it's because you're not addressing the question at all. Why would a heist be over in 5e because of a single, failed stealth roll?

Instead, you're shifting sideways saying that "well over here, we've got jargon, jargon, and jargon for playing that out" rather than actually telling me why you'd think a heist would be over (sad PacMan sounds again) because the invisible armored guy (who apparently wasn't smart enough to downgrade into something quieter) clanked by and guard happened to hear it.

This is what I am feeling about the question I thought was being addressed as well.

 

[dave2008]

It was indeed me who asked.


But this doesn't match what I asked.

What I asked was (I can go find the message if you want, but hope not to):

"Do people actually suggest changing systems MID-STREAM, i.e. in an existing campaign?"

I'm well aware that with campaigns that haven't started, or theoretical campaigns, people will suggest alternative systems, and I'm sorry but I'm never going to find that to be a problem unless it's a [+] thread about the OP's idea. Telling someone to change games mid-campaign was what you were mentioning though, and whilst that could be a real problem, I still haven't see any examples of that.

Got it - my bad!*

*I'm not sure if your familiar with the phrase "my bad." It is a phrase used in soccer (football to the world) to acknowledge when you've made a mistake or were the cause of difficulty for someone else. Or at least it was when I played in the 80s midwest USA.

 

[Campbell]

Where? Please show an example of this because I have totally missed it if true. Right now the argument seems to be arguing against a claim that D&D 5e doesn't actually have tools for resolving actions... that seems like its a far cry from claiming it does things better than any game.

You just spent the last couple pages arguing that Blades is no better at heists despite having no direct experience. This is what I mean by an unwillingness to give games basic credit for what they are good at.

 

[The-Magic-Sword]

What if I'm the GM and I want to find out what happens and not decide? What if I am a player and do not want the GM smoothing stuff out? There's all sorts of reasons for liking concrete rules that have nothing do with trust. One common one is a desire for consistency.

Then the dice are rolled to decide what happens (for the first) for the second, the system isn't there to win you an argument. BITD does this too, if you want to dispute your GM in an area where the GM 'has the final say' it just gives players the final say in some areas of the game instead.

• How dangerous and how effective is a given action in this circumstance? How risky is this? Can this person be swayed very little or a whole lot? The GM has final say.
• Which consequences are inflicted to manifest the dangers in a given circumstance? Does this fall from the roof break your leg? Do the constables merely become suspicious or do they already have you trapped? The GM has final say.

So if the GM says the person can't be swayed, or the GM smoothes it out by saying it works with some other minor consequence, BITD doesn't help you control them, or the answer to the question.

Edit: left out the most important one!

• Does this situation call for a dice roll, and which one? Is your character in position to make an action roll or must they first make a resistance roll to gain initiative? The GM has final say.

 

[Imaro]

You just spent the last couple pages arguing that Blades is no better at heists despite having no direct experience.

No I did not. I spent the last couple pages arguing that heists could be done with D&D and it had tools to accomplish it.

EDIT: For the record I have had experience with BitD but it was so long ago I recognize I don't really have the deep knowledge about it others in the thread do... thus the questions about it I have been asking.

 

[Manbearcat]

No, there are not canonical answers to these, except the core one -- the GM decides.

Yup. And its not just that.

Its that the game has some answers in some places that seem to apply to some things but perhaps not others? Or that they're supposed to be elided when "GM decides" they should be?

For instance, sometimes units are tightly codified, but it seems like folks just ignore/elide these constraints at their discretion. PHB 182 says Stealth Movement rate is 20 feet per round. Some Medium and all Heavy Armor rules says Disadvantage on Stealth.

But apparently, its pretty common for 5e GMs to go "nah, not applying that stuff here...Mr Fighter in Half-Plate who has to navigate a really long corridor (way more than 20 ft...perhaps 10 * or 20 * as far) stealthily...only 1 moment of action resolution and screw that Disadvantage on Stealth noise...roll Stealth normal * 1 and lets see if you navigate this corridor."

I mean, there are a lot of rules interactions here that could apply...a lot of attendant interpretations and adjudications by various GMs. But ultimately, this GM has decided 1 action resolution and no Disadvantage (ignoring p 145 and 182 of the PHB).

I mean its different if you've got something like 4e and you're toggling to cinematic, scene-based conflict resolution for noncombat (Skill Challenge). There, the procedures (eg you aren't using the minutiae of units of movement for example) and principles that inform GMing and playing change. But its different when that doesn't exist and play is encoded task resolution all the way down. So what you end up with GM decides (and in this case you end up with your Fighter who is wearing Half-Plate + Deep investment in Dex + Stealth Proficiency + investment in Medium Armor Master to remove Disadv = losing returns on the build choices because GM decided to minimize the importance/returns on the things you invested in) and respond accordingly.

There are trade-offs in GM decides and rules systems that require significant interpretation/mediation and just ignoring stuff when the GM feels its best for play. It has strengths (pace of play being one...interesting story if the GM is a good storyteller being another) and it has weaknesses.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

I think it depends. “You’re better off playing a game made for heists” is true if what you want to do is play a game about heists (or whatever). But as you say, you don’t really want to play a game about heists. You want to play a game that includes heists, among other things. Things for which a game made for heists may be ill-suited, or at least, less well-suited than D&D.

I think the core message is that system matters, and it is generally a good idea to pick a system that is well-suited to your purposes. Sometimes that means a bespoke system that was purpose-built to do exactly the thing you want (this is often especially true for one-shots). Sometimes it means a general system that handles most things well enough and can be added to as needed.

I think D&D’s biggest strength is in its recognition. Most people who play RPGs are familiar with it, so it’s very easy for most players to jump into, and they’re usually comfortable enough with it to be willing to push it to do things it wasn’t necessarily built to do, in ways they might not be comfortable doing with a less familiar system.

D&D has a few things that really stand out which can be really good. The basic ability score design is pretty good. It gives you a solid basis for characterization and breaks things down in a fairly logical and useful way. The level system is really great too, you get a very well-structured character progression that clearly incentivizes people to keep returning and playing to advance their character. Abstractions like AC and HP are practical and work, giving you a reasonable basis for a combat system that does melee well enough to meet the needs of most 'action genre' and allows for some pretty good progression into higher levels where it can handle some solid 'super heroic' sort of stuff. The overall fight/loot -> XP -> level up -> rest/train loop works, and can be tweaked a bit to accommodate a fair amount of fantasy gaming. The magic system is a bit peculiar and doesn't handle a lot of classic fantasy that well, but it is also pretty modular.

So there's more going for it than simply familiarity. OTOH I don't see any particular reason to favor it over various early 80's generic systems either for doing any random genre. All of them basically use nearly the same play process, they just have slightly different character facing rules and subsystems.

 

[Manbearcat]

Well of course you don't know how we communicate, it's because you're not addressing the question at all. Why would a heist be over in 5e because of a single, failed stealth roll?

Instead, you're shifting sideways saying that "well over here, we've got jargon, jargon, and jargon for playing that out" rather than actually telling me why you'd think a heist would be over (sad PacMan sounds again) because the invisible armored guy (who apparently wasn't smart enough to downgrade into something quieter) clanked by and guard happened to hear it.

That is your takeaway?

Seriously?

1) A "heist" is a nebulous term that isn't remotely helping conversation (which I tried to poke at earlier).

2) If the intent is "infil > exfil with the McGuffin without a trace", then yeah...cue your PacMan sounds.

3) If its "plan > infil > eventually pear-shaped > cue A Team explosions and destruction > exfil (whether fighting your way out until their are no more HPs to ablate or teleporting via your Wizard or a big chase) with the McGuffin with scorched earth in your wake" then cue the PacMan defeats level sounds.

I don't care if the Win Con is (2) or (3) as I put upthread...BUT THEY ARE DIFFERENT THINGS in a number of ways. That is the entire point. It would be nice if everyone would recognize that. I don't know why, but people refuse to acknowledge that these two things are not the same.

4) HOWEVER, Fail Forward's role in this kind of thing can be ABSOLUTELY DYSFUNCTIONAL (eg - you can't actually lose because there is no legit Loss Con...the GM will just string you along until they feel you've done enough to give you your Win Con Trophy) or ABSOLUTELY AWESOME and it DEPENDS UPON MECHANICAL ARCHETECTURE/INTEGRATION.

 

[tetrasodium]

Then the dice are rolled to decide what happens (for the first) for the second, the system isn't there to win you an argument. BITD does this too, if you want to dispute your GM in an area where the GM 'has the final say' it just gives players the final say in some areas of the game instead.

So if the GM says the person can't be swayed, or the GM smoothes it out by saying it works with some other minor consequence, BITD doesn't help you control them, or the answer to the question.

except in some of these other systems the gm doesn't need to have the final say & won't know how it will turn out once they set the stage to begin rolling the dice. Take the resources & aspects/social combat thing. describing that as "the gm has the final say" is like the gm throwing some monsters out onto the battlemat & declaring "the gm has the final say" about every pc & monster suddenly acting from a ruleset of "ask your gm" rather than codified abilities and such.

That doesn't mean that d&d needs fate style aspects & social combat or that it could even support them. That means any kind of situation that relies on extensive use of those tools is going to have advantages in a system like fate or bitd where those tools exist. D&D could sidestep this somewhat by providing guidance in some of these areas in ways that lean into the strengths of d&d as some prior editions have done through various methods with various areas of gm guidance/gm tools, but 5e largely avoids that too.