D&D 5E On rulings, rules, and Twitter, or: How Sage Advice Changed

[tetrasodium]

I mean, they're fine for reminding new players that they should actually roleplay, sure. The argument against them is that lots of other non-D&D games have mechanics that do the same thing, but better.

nearly any time I see the BITF come up it' in a distracting/disrupting way, they aren't really even all that good for new players. BITF are like someone took a cursory glance at another persn' description of Fate's high concept/trouble/character aspects without grasping the rest of the system & decided they knew enough to copy the important part without even understanding what they glanced at.

 

[BookTenTiger]

nearly any time I see the BITF come up it' in a distracting/disrupting way, they aren't really even all that good for new players. BITF are like someone took a cursory glance at another persn' description of Fate's high concept/trouble/character aspects without grasping the rest of the system & decided they knew enough to copy the important part without even understanding what they glanced at.

Opposite experiences at my tables!

Even for the experienced players, they have been a lot of fun. We don't hold ourselves enslaved to them, but it's a fun way to add facets to our characters that we normally wouldn't have.

For my new players, it really helps them think about their character as more than just a class and a race.

 

[turnip_farmer]

As a Dungeon Master, it's helpful to be aware of those player choices when designing adventures because I'm better able to anticipate how the characters might react in a given situation or social encounter.

In my experience, watching people play is apporximately a billion times more useful for that than reading something they promptly forgot after jotting it down at character generation.

 

[tetrasodium]

Opposite experiences at my tables!

Even for the experienced players, they have been a lot of fun. We don't hold ourselves enslaved to them, but it's a fun way to add facets to our characters that we normally wouldn't have.

For my new players, it really helps them think about their character as more than just a class and a race.

Part of the problem is that they re almost universally FR-centric roles tropes & stereotypes rather than something useful for describing who the character is as a person like 638 primary personality traits (a real thing pick one you like). That's made worse by not including meaningful guidance on creating your own to new players like fate's guidance on HC/T/CA or any meaningful way for the gm to do anything with or about them during play

 

[Ovinomancer]

Opposite experiences at my tables!

Even for the experienced players, they have been a lot of fun. We don't hold ourselves enslaved to them, but it's a fun way to add facets to our characters that we normally wouldn't have.

For my new players, it really helps them think about their character as more than just a class and a race.

I don't understand this -- do you mean you wouldn't have them because you wouldn't have thought to characterize your PC in that manner? I guess, if it's a prompt to you, that it's doing some good. My tables have had these kinds of things since I started playing -- ties to community, personal goals, character flaws, etc., so a prompt to add detail to your character isn't a strong selling point for me. You could just say "think about how your character acts, what personality traits they may have, who or what they believe in or are beholden to, and what, if any, flaws they may have." Single sentence, does the same work.

Again, the mechanical side of BIFTs isn't anything more than previous editions' recommendations for roleplaying XP.

 

[TwoSix]

I don't understand this -- do you mean you wouldn't have them because you wouldn't have thought to characterize your PC in that manner? I guess, if it's a prompt to you, that it's doing some good. My tables have had these kinds of things since I started playing -- ties to community, personal goals, character flaws, etc., so a prompt to add detail to your character isn't a strong selling point for me. You could just say "think about how your character acts, what personality traits they may have, who or what they believe in or are beholden to, and what, if any, flaws they may have." Single sentence, does the same work.

Yea, I think that's the sticking point here. If you're a novice or play with novices, you appreciate the roleplaying prompt a little more because you may not be in the habit of detailed characterization.

 

[BookTenTiger]

Part of the problem is that they re almost universally FR-centric roles tropes & stereotypes rather than something useful for describing who the character is as a person like 638 primary personality traits (a real thing pick one you like). That's made worse by not including meaningful guidance on creating your own to new players like fate's guidance on HC/T/CA or any meaningful way for the gm to do anything with or about them during play

Again, I can only share with you my experience at the table but I just have not seen that.

I've been able to comfortably use traits, Ideals, bonds, and Flaws in both the FR game I play in and the homebrew games I run. I think there are opportunities to have mechanical tie-ins, as in FATE, but I really enjoy them as they are!

 

[BookTenTiger]

I don't understand this -- do you mean you wouldn't have them because you wouldn't have thought to characterize your PC in that manner? I guess, if it's a prompt to you, that it's doing some good. My tables have had these kinds of things since I started playing -- ties to community, personal goals, character flaws, etc., so a prompt to add detail to your character isn't a strong selling point for me. You could just say "think about how your character acts, what personality traits they may have, who or what they believe in or are beholden to, and what, if any, flaws they may have." Single sentence, does the same work.

Again, the mechanical side of BIFTs isn't anything more than previous editions' recommendations for roleplaying XP.

I am a very experienced player who has always created characters with rich personalities and backgrounds... and I still find the traits, Ideals, bonds, and flaws useful!

For example, when I was creating my dwarven wizard, I had some ideas about his background, but the suggested ideas in the Archaeologist background gave me even more things to think about... does he have a mentor? Is he trying to get recognition? Are there museums? Journals?

When we first started playing 5e, we actually all agreed to roll randomly on traits, bonds, Ideals and flaws in order to challenge ourselves to play unusual characters!

I'm not trying to force you to use them, but I hope you now have examples of experienced players who enjoy the background traits, bonds, Ideals and flaws.

 

[Ovinomancer]

Again, I can only share with you my experience at the table but I just have not seen that.

I've been able to comfortably use traits, Ideals, bonds, and Flaws in both the FR game I play in and the homebrew games I run. I think there are opportunities to have mechanical tie-ins, as in FATE, but I really enjoy them as they are!

The thing is, though, that BIFTs are not an especially good example of just a characterization framework -- they're mediocre at best. If the intent is to prompt characterization, then there are better, simpler, more complicated, more detailed, more high level, etc., systems out there. It's a pretty generic thing that they do, and they don't do it with any aplomb or flair. Mechanically, they're mostly useless, even when you lean into them, unless you've enacted a good number of houserules to add teeth.

You may like them, and that's cool, but, in a broader context, they aren't very good design at all. They're mostly prompts, they don't stand out in the realm of prompts, and the mechanical backing is tacked on, weak, and adds to GM overhead in a game that already have massive GM overhead.

 

[overgeeked]

Yea, I think that's the sticking point here. If you're a novice or play with novices, you appreciate the roleplaying prompt a little more because you may not be in the habit of detailed characterization.

There are also long-time gamers who simply don't role-play in that sense. So it's not just novices who may not be in the habit of detailed characterization.