D&D General Why Exploration Is the Worst Pillar

[Ovinomancer]

If, in real life, I walk a trail I've never walked before and in so doing see views and vistas I've never seen before, I'm exploring.

We aren't talking about real life, Lanefan, but about the pillars of an pretend elf game. When I say that just getting some description and having no play loop means that the description then isn't part of the pillars of the game, I'm not saying anything at all about your real life walks in the woods.

Not exploring in the sense of discovering those views for the first time ever, but yes exploring in the personal sense of discovering those vistas for myself. They're new. (which is why I dislike things like google street view; if I've already seen it on a screen it doesn't feel like I'm exploring when I get there for real, as it's not new to me any more)

Ok.

Description isn't the pillar in and of itself, no; description is the results gained from engagement with the pillar. The fact that the PCs did what they did - even if just walking down a new trail - to provoke that description is the pillar writ large.

Description is necessary but not sufficient.

 

[Fanaelialae]

You just told me that choosing to not engage is a choice that makes a thing the exploration pillar. Why does the same logic not apply to the other pillars -- if I have a choice to engage combat, but don't, that should be combat pillar, right? Same if I don't engage in social stuff, still social stuff. You've outright said that players having the opportunity to interrupt some description but choosing not to means that's still exploration because they could. Why does this not apply elsewhere?

Because you are already in those pillars when you disengage.

The thing that it seems you're hung up on is that you still think that the description isn't part of the exploration pillar. But it is. When the players say we're taking the road to Waterdeep, they're engaging in exploration. The description of what they see along the way is exploration, which they can choose to investigate further or ignore.

I'll try to put it another way. Imagine that the players are exploring a dungeon. They're choosing which hallway to go down, whether or not to investigate rooms, etc.

Now imagine that the players say that they're going to follow the left wall. You just narrate to them what they see until they make a decision to do otherwise, which could be prompted by the DM (you see an orc ahead) or the players (who decide to investigate the door you just described).

The journey to Waterdeep is no different. They're following the road and you just narrate to them what they see until they make a decision to do otherwise. You might not have expected them to investigate the waterfall you just described, having intended it to be mere ambiance, but that makes it no less exploration.

 

[Ovinomancer]

Well, it could be argued that your example very much was exploration.

Sure, but not the exploration pillar of the game. Just exploration is whatever definition you really like -- this is exploration.. of the topic. It's not, however, part of the exploration pillar of the game.

You-as-DM describe 12 scenes the PCs see en route from Hicksville to Waterdeep, and the last scene is actionable. Excellent.

But why are you describing those other eleven scenes in the first place? Because somewhere back there the players declared the action "We'll travel on foot from Hicksville to Waterdeep" and describing those scenes is your chosen, if lengthy, means of resolving said action.

Possibly, but then we're okay with combat being a single declared swing of the sword and then a long description of the fight playing out, or a social encounter starting with, "Good morn, my Goodman Bob!" and then the GM narrating the rest of the conversation to you, yes? Good? Just resolution?

 

[Ovinomancer]

Because you are already in those pillars when you disengage.

I am? I see an orc, so I'm already in the combat and social pillars? Interesting take. Everything is in everything.

The thing that it seems you're hung up on is that you still think that the description isn't part of the exploration pillar. But it is. When the players say we're taking the road to Waterdeep, they're engaging in exploration. The description of what they see along the way is exploration, which they can choose to investigate further or ignore.

Again, as I seem to need to say this always just once more: description is necessary, but not sufficient. This means that it has to be part of the exploration pillar, but if it's on it's own, it's not enough to be the exploration pillar.

I'll try to put it another way. Imagine that the players are exploring a dungeon. They're choosing which hallway to go down, whether or not to investigate rooms, etc.

Now imagine that the players say that they're going to follow the left wall. You just narrate to them what they see until they make a decision to do otherwise, which could be prompted by the DM (you see an orc ahead) or the players (who decide to investigate the door you just described).

The journey to Waterdeep is no different. They're following the road and you just narrate to them what they see until they make a decision to do otherwise. You might not have expected them to investigate the waterfall you just described, having intended it to be mere ambiance, but that makes it no less exploration.

Sure, that's one way to do it. And none of that narration is part of the exploration pillar until and unless a play loop occurs.

 

[Fanaelialae]

I am? I see an orc, so I'm already in the combat and social pillars? Interesting take. Everything is in everything.

Again, as I seem to need to say this always just once more: description is necessary, but not sufficient. This means that it has to be part of the exploration pillar, but if it's on it's own, it's not enough to be the exploration pillar.

Sure, that's one way to do it. And none of that narration is part of the exploration pillar until and unless a play loop occurs.

Dude, I already said that seeing the orc is exploration, not social or combat. To disengage from social/combat, one party would need to talk/attack the other, respectively.

The game doesn't say that description is necessary, but not sufficient, that was you. For what it's worth, I technically agree. That said, I strongly believe that a lot of what you are discarding as "not exploration description" is in fact exploration description.

The play loop is already occuring. The players declared they were traveling to Waterdeep and now the DM is resolving it, telling them what they see along the way. This might result in its own recursive gameplay loop wherein the players take an interest in something the DM describes and investigate further.

 

[Oofta]

It is not, and the rules you've quoted do not say this. A passive score is either a repeated task or it's a tool for the GM to secretly check the results of an action.

I assume passive values are in use when the players have their characters doing things that require either evaluating a repeated use of a skill or if I need to secretly check how successful the PCs are at a thing they are doing -- just as the rule suggests. What you're doing here is taking the other statement from the rules that says that PCs are generally assumed to be staying alert to danger when in dangerous places, which establishes a default of attempting to perceive danger, as an always on things. It's not, it's a default. If the player declares a different action that would conflict, then they are no longer paying attention for danger. This is actually covered in a number of examples in the rules -- doing any of the other travel tasks other than keeping watch while traveling is automatically disadvantage on perception checks. There's space there for some actions that aren't on that list to deny perception checks altogether. This is part and parcel of the rules.

Then I have no idea how you would ever use passive values or have them in the game. If they're in enemy territory or have any reason at all to assume the area is dangerous (and may have traps) they're going to be alert. Saying "I walk down the hall" does not negate that awareness.

I would agree that something like moving as fast as possible through an area would likely result in a -5 (as an approximation of disadvantage) to their passive perceptions but that's a rare exception to the general expectation of the game.

 

[Ovinomancer]

Dude, I already said that seeing the orc is exploration, not social or combat. To disengage from social/combat, one party would need to talk/attack the other, respectively.

Yes, you've said this, but it doesn't make sense. Why is choosing to walk away from a sighted orc exploration but not the other things. You've just asserted, not explained. The explanation we have for how it could be exploration is that they could choose to do something explorationy, but choose to not, so that puts that not-choice into exploration. But this doesn't change if we swap out for combat or social -- it's the same argument. Yet, you say it isn't.

The game doesn't say that description is necessary, but not sufficient, that was you. For what it's worth, I technically agree. That said, I strongly believe that a lot of what you are discarding as "not exploration description" is in fact exploration description.

I haven't discarded anything as "not exploration description." I've said that such description isn't part of the exploration pillar, because it's standing alone -- it's insufficient.

The play loop is already occuring. The players declared they were traveling to Waterdeep and now the DM is resolving it, telling them what they see along the way. This might result in its own recursive gameplay loop wherein the players take an interest in something the DM describes and investigate further.

See my challenge to @Lanefan -- is this acceptable in any other pillar? Are extended resolutions of combat, where the result of the first action is run all the way through to combat completion but with thrilling descriptions sufficient for combat? Or similarly for social encounters? What makes exploration different that extended, disconnected descriptions of different moments on a trip fall into resolution of an action but the others don't?

 

[Ovinomancer]

Then I have no idea how you would ever use passive values or have them in the game. If they're in enemy territory or have any reason at all to assume the area is dangerous (and may have traps) they're going to be alert. Saying "I walk down the hall" does not negate that awareness.

I agree. As for how I use them, I've been pretty straightforward. "I walk down the hall," doesn't contradict or conflict with the normal assumption of alertness to danger. "I walk down the hall while studying the tome we just found," does.

I would agree that something like moving as fast as possible through an area would likely result in a -5 (as an approximation of disadvantage) to their passive perceptions but that's a rare exception to the general expectation of the game.

Or tracking. Or foraging. Or mapmaking. Or navigating. All in the rules, dude.

 

[Lanefan]

The reason Hussar is focusing only on challenges, and I think he is right to do so, is because that is the part of the discussion that matters most for the issues in the exploration pillar, and too many people are trying to have too broad of a view of “exploration” to be useful.

Is describing the majesty of Mount Crumpet part of exploration? Whether it is or isn’t, it would never be covered by the rules and it would be impossible to engage with. Describing a howling blizzard is easy, but when we describe it, set it up so that the players feel that going out tonight would be dangerous, but they do it anyways… we find that it isn’t dangerous. Per the rules as they are written, if they went out in winter clothes (a bare minimum that they should have) then traveling through a blizzard is just as challenging as traveling through a foggy morning by the coast.

And so, yes, there are non-challenges, and they can be important, but they are also things that are generally outside of the rules. And if there were strong ways to make challenges in Exploration without gutting the rules, it wouldn’t even be a question. But there aren’t, and since talking about “exploration in general” is getting confusing, then we need to focus in on the issue people are having. Which is explicitly exploration challenges.

Fair enough; and I agree that exploration challenges can be hard to manufacture given all the out-clauses 5e gives its characters. It's a problem that long predates 5e, though 5e certainly hasn't done anything to solve it.

What I'm seeing, though, is a repeated sentiment that amounts to "Because exploration has few or no challenges and-or doesn't engage with many game mechanics, it isn't important to game play". I very much disagree that lack of challenge in a game element makes that element unimportant or irrelevant.

Example: the PCs chatting with each other around the campfire. No challenge anywhere and nary a game mechanic in sight yet this type of Social-pillar stuff is often absolutely vital for character development, and in some cases for player engagement.

Well, to some extent the same goes for non-challenge freeform exploration: it's a useful means of immersion into the setting for all, and for some it provides a higher degree of engagement.

But there also gets to be a point where the risks are nil and the chances of failure so low, that I don’t see the point in making failure a possibility.

Indeed; I think we mught be simply disagreeing as to where that cutoff point is.

There have been times when my DM has the party split, and one group has to wait three hours in the guild hall to get a license or whatever, and my character is searching the victim’s home for clues. I’ll just tell the DM “I spend two hours searching every part of the room”

Where I'll play it out; it's a known fact of life here that there'll be times when some of the PCs (and thus players) won't be involved for a while, which if nothing else gives those not-involved players a chance to grab a beer or get some non-game chat out of their systems. (usually for something like this, were I the DM I'd take you into another room and sort out your PC's searching efforts in a bit more detail)

Is there a chance I missed something? Theoritically yes, but practically if searching a room takes 10 minutes, I could roll six times and take the best result, and we all know the odds that are incredibly low. And I know, you don’t like it that people don’t have to state every single place they look, in detail, but why take that table time for something that we both know I can do? Unless you are expecting me to mess up and forget something IRL, and I’m just not interested in having to constantly prove myself to get the clues. To me, it is just tedium.

Ah, but the way I see it is that if searching the room takes 10 minutes then after that 10 minutes you'll get a roll to see how well your searching went, and that's that. Spending another 10 minutes - or another two hours - simply isn't going to help unless you materially change something you're doing; as your initial roll has already determined the results of your best effort. (re-rolling is a non-starter for me)

But a material change in approach means you're in effect starting over. For example, if your initial search was done discreetly so as to not leave signs of your presence and came up dry, changing tack to "Screw it, I don't care if they know I was here" and trying again would get another roll.

And on the front of realism, what you just described is literally how they train law enforcement. Per 5e (and I know, the changes between editions) if you are proficient in a skill, you are considered good enough at it to have a job doing that skill. So, if you have someone trained in Investigation, they are just as good as law enforcement. Expertise might be the level needed to be playing in the spy-counterspy level. If you sent 100 spies trained in counter-espionage into a room where you hid something, even really well, and gave them all day to find it do you honestly think the majority of them wouldn’t?

This points to a difference in how we perceive characters in general, perhaps.

I tend to see adventurers as ordinary people who have become good at a few things but - far more importantly - are willing to take risks and endure hardships that others are not.

And sure, someone trained in investigation might be as good as real-world law enforcement; but without all the modern tech (or magic, in a game world) that might not be saying very much.

You hid it in the floor? One of the things I’m doing is tapping, checking and running my hands along the entire floor, because people always hide something in the floor. Then I do it to the walls. Then I do it to the ceiling, then I door it to the door, and the wardrobe, and on and on and on.

Additionally, the more important you make the single roll, the more resources they will stack into that roll. They might fail a DC 20 when they have a +7 mod, but if they have +7, advantage, a +1d8 and a +1d4 the chances drop precipitously, and of course they are going to then do that for every single roll.

Advantage and, on average, +15? I thought 5e's bounded accuracy was supposed to eliminate that sort of thing!

 

[Asisreo]

Possibly, but then we're okay with combat being a single declared swing of the sword and then a long description of the fight playing out, or a social encounter starting with, "Good morn, my Goodman Bob!" and then the GM narrating the rest of the conversation to you, yes? Good? Just resolution?

This is an exaggerated take of exactly what we do in those other pillars. Obviously we don't have a single attack or sentence resolve everything, but we have resolutions that last until the next meaningful choice can be made.

A player says he swings his sword and the DM says "The orc narrowly dodges out of the deadliest part, taking a graze." We could dress it up even more if we want "The orc wipes the blood and, oddly, smirks at you. He growls and...yada yada." But none of this is actionable up until the DM finally says "Okay, then next turn."

So if you resolve a whole travel sequence, the implication is that there was no turn for the players to take action until you stop. Maybe interruptions can change that, but if you truly want players to explore, you really should stop every time you set up a new situation.