D&D General Styles of Roleplaying and Characters

[hawkeyefan]

Why would only one person be familiar with the people or situation? They've engaged those people and the situation as a group and would typically all be equally familiar.

They may or may not be based on the examples I gave. Like, if you’re dealing with a thieves’ guild, do you really think having a rogue do the talking is the same as having the naive acolyte cleric do it? If you’re trying to get jobs on a merchant caravan, maybe have your fighter with the merchant guard background talk to the quartermaster rather than the tiefling warlock who doesn’t shut up about Mephistopheles.

Again, it’s about leveraging strengths in the game that suit the fiction. And it in no way blocks roleplaying. It’s actively using character elements.

Now you're just moving the goal posts. If only one person speaks the language, yes that one person will have to do all the talking. Thing is, it's just as likely to be the guy with the -1 charisma modifier as it is the party face. This is not the same situation as you were describing above.

I’d say Languages Spoken is a social mechanic, so I’m not moving goalposts so much as I’m just offering another example. You’re right…it may be the guy with the crappy charisma. So do we let him speak for the party, or do we rely on him to translate? Or maybe the cleric can cast speak languages…but is it worth the spell slot to get a +3 on this roll rather than the -1.

None of which are a "party face" situation.

You seem to have assumed this is what I meant when what I said was leveraging strengths. That doesn’t all boil down to having one PC who is the face of the party. Although I think that having someone fill that role by default is pretty common. But it really depends on what’s happening in the fiction.

We can come up with exceptions to the rule all day long. Those exceptions don't change into anything else but exceptions. Typically when the group is engaged socially, it's not going to make sense for only one person to do all the talking.

I think it happens often enough. Or that one person does a good chunk of it. And again, I never said that this should all be the face. I talked about leveraging strengths.

It's very situation dependent. Some of it will be just talking with no rolls. Other times there will be rolls made by different individuals. I will be roleplaying the lord and they can guess at the bonds, etc., but I'm not going to just tell the players what those are. Yes, I have my NPCs act in accordance to their beliefs. If the lord is talking to 5 PCs and one was a beggar and the lord knows it, he's probably going to avoid talking to that PC, even if it's the party face. There are tons of variables involved. Many more than the ones you just listed.

So you don’t use some of the actual social mechanics of 5e? Finding out a Trait, Ideal, Bond, or Flaw is an action the PCs can take. You don’t allow that?

But you do call for rolls sometimes, but not others? Backgrounds may matter, but they may not?

I agree a lot of these things would be situational, but I’m not getting any kind of sense of how a social scene would play at your table.

 

[Maxperson]

I’d say Languages Spoken is a social mechanic, so I’m not moving goalposts so much as I’m just offering another example. You’re right…it may be the guy with the crappy charisma. So do we let him speak for the party, or do we rely on him to translate? Or maybe the cleric can cast speak languages…but is it worth the spell slot to get a +3 on this roll rather than the -1.

The PCs, the ones doing the talking, aren't going to know -1 or +3. They will simply know that one of them is a better speaker than the other. I don't know about you, but there have been many times in my life where someone on my side of a discussion has said something stupid or just the the wrong thing to say and it made me cringe. People who don't speak well generally don't sit back and let others do the talking for them unless it's one of those exceptional circumstances you brought up.

So you don’t use some of the actual social mechanics of 5e? Finding out a Trait, Ideal, Bond, or Flaw is an action the PCs can take. You don’t allow that?

This is what it says in the 5e PHB on page 186 about social interactions.

"When interacting with an NPC, pay close attention to the DM's portrayal of the NPC's mood, dialogue, and personality. You might be able to determine an NPC's personality traits, ideals, flaws, and bonds, then play on them to influence the NPC's attitude."

So just like I said. I roleplay it out and if they pay attention, they might be able to figure them out and use them to influence the NPC.

 

[The-Magic-Sword]

I didn't make any claim about what is intrinsic. I identified a RPGing context in which I prefer zero-dimensional characters to one-dimensional ones. (Taking it for granted that, in a WPM-ish dungeon crawl, three-dimensional characters are out of the question for the reasons given by Christopher Kubasik.)

I'm not sure who the us is supposed to be in your post (other than you). My view is that (i) White Plume Mountain is a very un-promising context for meaningful or moving portrayals of character, and (ii) that if I sit down to play it - with the aim of beating the dungeon - then I am not interested in either fears of heights or derring-do. You don't win White Plume Mountain via derring-do; you win it via careful planning and problem solving, plus some good luck in the fights.

If I wanted a RPG to give me the feel of a Marvel movie I would not use White Plume Mountain (or any of its cousins) and classic D&D resolution: my go-to would be Marvel Heroic RP, but if someone could work out a suitably adapted version of Prince Valiant (ie how to get powers into the PC builds) I reckon that could do the job also.

Based off the last paragraph you seem to have misunderstood: my point is that you can do more than one thing at a time and that usually makes it better, thereby suggesting that your sense of distilled laser focus is perhaps unrefined, marvel movies work as well as they do by the way that they mix elements that you could be focused on more.

To my mind, the conception of White Plume Mountain (and lets be real, we're discussing its cousins and DND resolution here) you have offered the thread, is dry and lacking in insight, because it fails to appreciate the benefits that these elements (characterization, nuance, planning and problem solving) can offer each other in a mixture. I know that this is true because I've done it, and seen it done, and seen it catch on, and seen it be lusted after.

You seem to be attempting to use your subjectivity as a conversational bludgeon to present your views as above, or outside critique, immutable. I am framing you as wrong in the reasons you believe what you do, which incidentally, lies at the central core of discussion and debate.

 

[Lanefan]

Worst-case here seems to mean something Lanefan doesn't enjoy.

In The Dying Earth, Burning Wheel and Prince Valiant - just to point to three systems I know and play - PCs can influence other PCs via the same mechanical framework that applies in PC-to-NPC interactions.

In Agon, there is a process undertaken during each Voyage to determine who will be the Leader of the PCs when they arrive at the next Island. When resolving the Strife on an Island, any dispute among the PCs is resolved by the Leader. But any non-leader player may spend one point of Bond with the Leader in order to have the Leader take their advice.

All these systems work fine, in my experience at least.

Given how stridently and consistently you tend to bang the player-agency drum I'm really surprised you're cool with any of this, given that all of it represents players being given system-based means to deny the agency of other players over their PCs.

Seems to me like a recipe for arguments unless players are actively willing to give up their agency (and players willingly giving up their agency doesn't seem like a position you'd support, given how hard and long you've fought for that agency in the first place).

I'm not willing to give up that agency.

 

[Lanefan]

Interesting that by far the most words are dedicated to combat…by a huge margin…and yet you say the core activity is something else entirely.

Equating word count with importance-to-game is a category error.

Sure, combat's important. But without in-character roleplaying to tie it together, what's the point of calling it an RPG?

Yes, combat abstraction takes a lot of words to explain. Spells take a lot of words to explain. Character generation takes a lot of words to explain. In-character roleplaying doesn't take nearly as many words to explain as any of those other things yet is at least as important to game play as any of them.

 

[Lanefan]

For me, being always able to choose my character's emotional response is oddly dissociative.

In games where it doesn't come up much, or PCs are expected to be relatively emotionless (eg classic D&D) it's not a big deal. But in context where we're talking about (what Colville calls) 3D portrayals of character I find it pretty weird.

That strikes me as very odd, unless I'm missing something. To me its dissociative to not have control over my character's emotions, unless some sort of mind-control magic is in play.

And even though we play a version of classic D&D, our characters still have - and show - emotions of all kinds.

 

[Aldarc]

Right. Punching someone in the face is a perfect analogy for not having structured rules. Being told that things I say are incorrect when I'm just stating an opinion or use an imperfect example because people rarely actually share any concrete rules, that because I have a preference it means I'm criticizing people or games that are different. Of course I can't say "I wouldn't want that" because I haven't played a dozen other TTRPGs so I can't have an opinion. I get tired of repeating: this is my opinion and preference.

Some people want a metagame so they can make decisions based on that metagame knowledge, that D&D lacks support for that pillar of the game. Personally I think D&D is better off not trying to be something it's not. I don't want rules for romance or intrigue even though those things happen often in my games. I don't want "true love" to be some kind of supernatural power unless it makes sense for my specific plot and story arc.

P.S. if people want to give a concise overview of how other systems work - great! Maybe start a "plus" thread on how to implement them in D&D. Start a discussion, publish it to the DmsGuild.

You keep using "it's only your opinion" as a shield for making some pretty falsifiable or unreasonable assertions about other games, mechanics, and even about other people that lie outside of simply expressing your preferences. When you get called out on them or people have the audacity to call you out to back those opinions up, then you retreat behind simply having an opinion as if it were somehow unassailable position, which it's not. So from my own observations, you really are doing a lot of "bait and switch" in your argument, Oofta. Simply having an opinion doesn't necessarily mean that it's a valid one or that it's well reasoned or substantiated from the evidence. It's one thing to have a preference but what you prefer doesn't give you unchallenged license to make unsubstantiated claims about other games, mechanics, or even about the people who prefer them. If you get tired of repeating the bold, then maybe don't keep repeating and blundering your errors. Take time to understand the criticism of the argument and why people are having a difficult time with the mixed message you are making.

Because "leveraging strengths" in the social sphere means some of the players don't get to participate in the core activity of the game: roleplaying the personae of their characters.

Your assertion is pretty easy to disprove by the actual evidence of many other people and their games accumulated over decades of game experience.

 

[pemerton]

Based off the last paragraph you seem to have misunderstood: my point is that you can do more than one thing at a time and that usually makes it better, thereby suggesting that your sense of distilled laser focus is perhaps unrefined, marvel movies work as well as they do by the way that they mix elements that you could be focused on more.
To my mind, the conception of White Plume Mountain (and lets be real, we're discussing its cousins and DND resolution here) you have offered the thread, is dry and lacking in insight, because it fails to appreciate the benefits that these elements (characterization, nuance, planning and problem solving) can offer each other in a mixture. I know that this is true because I've done it, and seen it done, and seen it catch on, and seen it be lusted after.

I am not talking about D&D resolution.

Nothing I have said about playing White Plume Mountain has any bearing, for instance, on any 4e play I have participated in. (I know some people regard 4e D&D as not-D&D; but I assume that's not a premise of your post.) Nor does it have any bearing on the AD&D play I was engaged in in the second half of the 1980s, which was heavily influenced by the original OA.

I am talking about White Plume Mountain and its cousins - Hidden Shrine, ToH, the Caves of Chaos, The Lichway, Ghost Tower of Inverness, etc. And as per my post upthread that triggered this whole sideshow, if I am sitting down to play that sort of dungeon crawl, with the aim of beating the dungeon, portrayals of the gnome's hatred of fish or fear of heights is something between a distraction and a disruption.

Maybe I should add: in that sort of play I don't see the goal of play being to portray a character who wants to beat the dungeon. I see the goal being to beat the dungeon. Gygax expressed the relevant conception of roleplaying, for this context, on p 18 of his PHB:

The approach you wish to take to the game, how you believe you can most successfully meet the challenges which it poses, and which role you desire to play are dictated by character class (or multi-class).​

Perhaps you prefer to play dungeon crawls differently from me: you see my preference as dry; I see yours as irritating (based on my experience of approaches that seem to resemble what you're describing that I had in my University club days). That tells us we shouldn't play White Plume Mountain together! There's no further insight to be derived than that.

You seem to be attempting to use your subjectivity as a conversational bludgeon to present your views as above, or outside critique, immutable. I am framing you as wrong in the reasons you believe what you do, which incidentally, lies at the central core of discussion and debate.

On the contrary, you and some other posters seem determined to tell me that I am wrong in stating what my preferences are for playing White Plume Mountain and similar sorts of modules. You are telling me that if I adopted some other set of preferences then either (i) I would enjoy it more (which I doubt, based on my own past experience) or (ii) I would be more like you. That second is probably true, but I'm not sure what you want me to do about it.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Mod Note:

I’m not naming names, but I’m seeing patterns of certain posters not getting along with certain other posters. In thread after thread- this one included- they lock horns. Phrases like “this is your standard way of doing things”, “you always do this”, “this is typical of you” start popping up In numerous exchanges.

Most of the time, it doesn’t rise to the level of actionable incivility, but it does increase tensions, it does get reported. And that means a Mod has to investigate.

This might require a bit of introspection, but might I suggest if this sounds familiar to you, try putting your nemesis on your ignore list. At least, try it out for a month to see how it fits.

 

[Aldarc]

That strikes me as very odd, unless I'm missing something. To me its dissociative to not have control over my character's emotions, unless some sort of mind-control magic is in play.

When it comes to simulating reality: human beings do not have full control over their emotions. Scientific studies show this time and time again. Our increased scientific understanding of human cognition has done a pretty marvelous job at deconstructing the presumed "human rationalism" of the Enlightenment. Economics and Law, whose theories have been fairly undergirded by Enlightement rationalism, has also had to make adjustments in accordance with our new understandings as well. We do not have full control over our emotions, so why would players have full control over their PC's emotions? A lack of complete control helps simulate that realism and playing a role. Having complete control over the character's emotions, dare I say, arguably ventures roleplaying more towards the "author" or "pawn" stance where the player has complete authorship over everything about the character. I find it disassociative when we make exceptions for these things only for magic. It would be fine if magic in D&D was some sort of metaphor for our uncontrollable emotions, but it's clearly not. It's usually more akin to roofies and other less desirable human behaviors.

Some people have clearly stated that they want a structured rules around social interactions so they can metagame and judge risks and potential outcomes. Others have mentioned games where you discover that your PC is attracted to a member of the same sex.

I think the first risks putting the metagame ahead of the role playing, the latter is telling me what my character feels. I could go on with other examples. Am I 100% accurate on descriptions of other games? How could I be when there are only a small handful of examples after more than 300 posts? Most responses are once again, like yours, personal accusations of "you don't understand". Well then freakin' explain it! Instead of nitpicking the details, why not give me concise examples of what you do mean? Or better yet, since this is a side-topic, just start another thread, even a plus thread so you don't get a**holes like me dissing it and discuss all the awesome things you could bring to the game?

Again the point of Monsterhearts is that it's about the tumultous time of teens discovering their sexuality and puberty. Feelings can be surprising and self revelatory. Sometimes these things lie outside of our control. Does someone choose their sexuality? Does someone decide that they are aroused at an inopportune time? You the player still has the agency to decide how your character acts in the fiction, but now you have discovered something about your character that neither they nor you necessarily knew about them. It's about discovering your character who changes as a result of the fiction. It's not for everyone, but it's important to understand the strengths and weaknessess of such approaches and why people are drawn to them.