D&D General Can we talk about best practices?

[Thomas Shey]

This is even a criticism of the idea of "best" practices in other settings as well since many of them tend to be contextual and poorly analyzed as measurably "best".
But let's be clear that in the case of RPGs the application of the idea of best practices is about finding the best practices... for having fun. And you're really not going to get a hell of a lot more subjective than that.

That's why I say you have to narrow the scope significantly before "best practices" makes much sense. At best you otherwise can do things that add up to "These thing in general will reduce the chance of the sociodynamics of the game group cooking up on you" (some of which will be unnecessary given the specifics).

 

[Cadence]

And similar can be applied to most types and styles of play and running games. If you’re trying to do a politically complex game, try these things while trying to avoid these other things. Or hexcrawling or dungeoncrawling or action-adventure or horror or immersion or whatever. But apparently even acknowledging that fact is somehow bad form.

Has anyone said that discussing what has worked well for them personally in different situations is bad? That might work great, especially as a + thread where only constructive on topic things are supposed to go on.


On the other hand starting off with leading theses and then insisting that way is better feels like it would be bad.

 

[overgeeked]

That's why I say you have to narrow the scope significantly before "best practices" makes much sense. At best you otherwise can do things that add up to "These thing in general will reduce the chance of the sociodynamics of the game group cooking up on you" (some of which will be unnecessary given the specifics).

At what point is it needlessly softening language to satisfy hopelessly pedantic people? A phrase like “best practices” shouldn’t be objectionable in this context, yet it is. No one would reasonably take that phrase to mean sterling and pure meta-rules that must be obeyed...or else. Yet that’s exactly how it’s being treated.

 

[Thomas Shey]

At what point is it needlessly softening language to satisfy hopelessly pedantic people? A phrase like “best practices” shouldn’t be objectionable in this context, yet it is. No one would reasonably take that phrase to mean sterling and pure meta-rules that must be obeyed...or else. Yet that’s exactly how it’s being treated.

To be blunt, because in this context I think your desire to discuss "best practices" is read, correctly or not, as an attempt to beg the question as to whether they are, based on your particular expectations in a game. If that makes you unhappy, it does, but its absolutely the way its coming across.

Its manifestly unuseful to try to do something which adds up to instructions as to how to best do something until you have everyone mostly on the same page as to what that something actually is, unless you want to frame every part of it with the assumptions in use. If you don't understand why that is, I don't know what to tell you.

 

[hawkeyefan]

Here are my suggested best practices for 5E D&D. These are all just based on the general game itself, and not toward trying to run it a specific way, or trying to give it a specific vibe. These are just my opinion, of course.

Players:

• Remember that this is a group activity, and that the thrust of play will be about the group
• Don't try and make a character that will "win"- make a character that will be interesting, make a character you'd like to learn more about
• Be willing to engage with ideas offered by others, particularly the GM- the GM will establish a lot of the fiction in the game and will present most of the conflicts- be willing to engage with these ideas
• Hold on loosely to your preconceived ideas about your character- don't over commit to every detail before play even begins- allow space for discovery through play and adapting to what gets established
• Expect that sometimes the GM may make a ruling that may override the rules

GMs:

• Remember that this is a group activity and allow players to have as much input on how the game goes as possible
• Don't try to tell a specific story- create scenarios that you feel would be interesting, and then watch what the players have the characters do, and then build on that
• Be willing to engage with ideas offered by the players- try to never override or render meaningless any decision made by the players
• Be a fan of the PCs- the game is about them, not about your setting- keep that in mind and hold on lightly to your setting and NPCs as they exist only to see how they interact with the PCs
• Be cautious with making rulings that override the rules; when it does happen, be clear about your reasoning for doing so

I've come up with this list quickly and off the top of my head, thinking about my recent games of 5E as both player and GM. I'm sure I can could come up with more, or that I could expand and/or clarify these. And although I don't think everyone would agree with them all, I don't think any of them is all that controversial. But even so, I imagine there are plenty of other ideas out there that folks could offer along these lines.

 

[pemerton]

It's not controversial, to my knowledge, to talk about best responses in chess to various openings.

The rulebook that came with my backgammon set several decades ago has a section describing the best opening moves for various starting dice rolls. Of course as one becomes more familiar with the play of the game one sometimes departs from those suggestions, and the labelling of them as "best opening moves" has not caused any confusion to me or my friends and family members who have read the same rulebook.

We talk about the best ways to kick a football, the best ways to make a tackle (obviously there are multiple such ways, depending on context and precise goal), the best way to smother an opposing player's kick, etc. I'm not very sporty but I think that similar things are talked about in relation to other sports and athletic pursuits.

My experience with theatre, and performance more generally, is extremely modest but my understanding is that it's fairly common to talk about ways to improve one's acting, and how best to engage in improv, etc.

The goal of all these things, of course - at least for non-professionals - is to have fun, but the "best practice" advice doesn't confine itself to make sure you're enjoying yourself. In fact the advice tends to take it for granted that participants enjoy the activity (why else would they be participating?) and then advises on how to do it well. Gygax, in a similar vein, concludes his PHB (before the Appendices) with a section of best-practice tips for players called "Successful Adventures" that ends with the sentence "If you believe that ADVANCED DUNGEONS & DRAGONS is a game worth playing, you will certainly find it doubly so if you play well."

I find it hard to belief that 5e D&D is so different from all these other leisure pursuits that we can't talk sensibly about best practice ideas.

 

[Fanaelialae]

At what point is it needlessly softening language to satisfy hopelessly pedantic people? A phrase like “best practices” shouldn’t be objectionable in this context, yet it is. No one would reasonably take that phrase to mean sterling and pure meta-rules that must be obeyed...or else. Yet that’s exactly how it’s being treated.

If it allows you to have the conversation your looking to have, is adjusting your language really that great a sacrifice?

I didn't object to best practices to begin with, but my philosophy is that if other people find it problematic, adjust accordingly. It's virtually no effort on my part, and it makes the experience of others more positive, so I can't really see why I wouldn't. The alternative is a frustrating experience for me that other also perceive negatively (and who wants that).

 

[Thomas Shey]

Here are my suggested best practices for 5E D&D. These are all just based on the general game itself, and not toward trying to run it a specific way, or trying to give it a specific vibe. These are just my opinion, of course.


[...]

I've come up with this list quickly and off the top of my head, thinking about my recent games of 5E as both player and GM. I'm sure I can could come up with more, or that I could expand and/or clarify these. And although I don't think everyone would agree with them all, I don't think any of them is all that controversial. But even so, I imagine there are plenty of other ideas out there that folks could offer along these lines.

Note how many of these are general group dynamic rules that could probably be ported over to almost any RPG whatsoever. That's largely my point about how, in absence of specifics about the game experience being tried for you almost have to work on that layer.

 

[Dausuul]

This is even a criticism of the idea of "best" practices in other settings as well since many of them tend to be contextual and poorly analyzed as measurably "best".

Oh yes. I work in IT, don't get me started.

At what point is it needlessly softening language to satisfy hopelessly pedantic people? A phrase like “best practices” shouldn’t be objectionable in this context, yet it is. No one would reasonably take that phrase to mean sterling and pure meta-rules that must be obeyed...or else. Yet that’s exactly how it’s being treated.

The term "best practices" is not a phrase that is used in conversational English. It's only ever used as a term of art. So if you start a thread about "best practices," anyone familiar with the term is going to assume that's what you mean by it.

And since "onetruewayism" is in fact an issue that crops up regularly on these forums, with people issuing sweeping declarations about The Right Way To D&D, it's not an insane assumption that when somebody uses a term which is literally synonymous with onetruewayism--and even mentions in the OP that they anticipate complaints about that!--that's exactly what they mean.

 

[Thomas Shey]

It's not controversial, to my knowledge, to talk about best responses in chess to various openings.

The rulebook that came with my backgammon set several decades ago has a section describing the best opening moves for various starting dice rolls. Of course as one becomes more familiar with the play of the game one sometimes departs from those suggestions, and the labelling of them as "best opening moves" has not caused any confusion to me or my friends and family members who have read the same rulebook.

We talk about the best ways to kick a football, the best ways to make a tackle (obviously there are multiple such ways, depending on context and precise goal), the best way to smother an opposing player's kick, etc. I'm not very sporty but I think that similar things are talked about in relation to other sports and athletic pursuits.

My experience with theatre, and performance more generally, is extremely modest but my understanding is that it's fairly common to talk about ways to improve one's acting, and how best to engage in improv, etc.

The goal of all these things, of course - at least for non-professionals - is to have fun, but the "best practice" advice doesn't confine itself to make sure you're enjoying yourself. In fact the advice tends to take it for granted that participants enjoy the activity (why else would they be participating?) and then advises on how to do it well. Gygax, in a similar vein, concludes his PHB (before the Appendices) with a section of best-practice tips for players called "Successful Adventures" that ends with the sentence "If you believe that ADVANCED DUNGEONS & DRAGONS is a game worth playing, you will certainly find it doubly so if you play well."

I find it hard to belief that 5e D&D is so different from all these other leisure pursuits that we can't talk sensibly about best practice ideas.

I will have to note that as you get down that list, "best practice" discussions become fraught in almost the same way as here--because there's less agreement of what exactly you're trying to do. Even with football there's enough moving parts that the validity of many techniques is debatable depending on a lot of exterior factors such as composition of the team and the normal climate of the area.

And those are all games that have a specific set of win conditions and largely rigid rules as to how they work. Once you get to theater...well, yes, there are things some people present as best practices, but there are a lot of cases of people saying they're full of it too, because they are based on specific assumptions about what an actor is trying to do and what gets them there best that are not universal by any means. Look at just the response to method acting to see that, and that's just the tip of the iceberg.