D&D General Styles of Roleplaying and Characters

[Oofta]

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.

It may be weird to you, but it has come up in discussion with fellow gamers. People don't want to be told what their PC think or feel. It's come up on this forum with people that hate being told they wouldn't do something because of their alignment. It's come up in discussions of Critical Role how people don't like how Matt will sometimes tell people what they feel.

Personally? I would not like it. I guess you could do a survey to get a better idea, but I think being totally in control of your PC is fundamental to the game. As far as PCs being emotionless, I'm not sure what to say. Most people show plenty of emotion, nothing needs to be forced upon them. To me it would be weird if the game dictated that my PC was [insert emotion] instead of it being something my PC would feel.

Different strokes and all.

 

[Oofta]

I the context of d&d dungeon crawls, i definitely prefer very 'pawn stance' style play, with just a tease of character(i'm actually playing a GURPS game like that right now). I think, as others have said, the system and its benefits are a lot more suited to making strong archetypes to do very specific kinds of things in a fantasy world than handling anything. I'd never use d&d to run a game where the characters were anything other than rough-and-tumble mercenaries of various archetypes who really like to spelunk for treasure.

If I want to play a game where the character of the characters matter a lot more, i'd want something with a more robust allowance for what you can make. A military officer with soldiers at his command, a priest who has knowledge and social skills rather than casting divine spells, a scholar, etc. There's a lot of systems that do that, but d&d isn't really about that, it's made a sacrifice(and i think is better tuned to that past 3rd ed) to make character creation easy, and you don't need a guide if you want to be like this strong fantasy archetype, but the sacrifice is other kinds of characters without a lot of shoehorning.

There are significant advantages to d&d pawn stance or very light characterization games- they can handle more players a lot more easily, it's also much easier to handle absenteeism when characters are largely interchangable in terms of the game. You can kill characters more comfortably without much bad blood, nobody's too invested in things, you don't really have to worry so much about giving people chances as a DM. If I had a game where the cleric and her faith were a super important part of the plot and her player missed a session, either that player is going to be unsatisfied that their cleric's spotlight time was missed or the DM is going to have to cancel due to one absence.

On the other hand, if i'm playing a more intricate game, i really do want to know what esoteric things your character knows about, what they can speak intelligently about, and i'd like that on a sheet. In a sense, the D&D skill system seems vestigial, it's a weird list that seems oddly narrow but I do accept that it's replacing a lot of funky subsystems that would otherwise have to be there a la percentile stuff in 2e. Burning Wheel, for example, has a robust skill list, as does GURPS and many other games, and the skill system is central and core, your characters are, functionally very much defined by them, though not entirely so.(I find it awkward that when i was playing BW, their starter adventure, The Sword was trying to mix BW's mechanics with a d&d type situation and I think it's just not suited. I don't think cave spelunking leads to interesting Beliefs or really uses that game's systems well.)

The main thing I want to point out here is that you seem to state that everyone plays D&D with the pawn stance. We don't, most games I've been involved with over the years do not. AL public games are close because of the format.

There's nothing wrong with playing D&D as a beer & pretzels game with minimal characterization, nor is playing a game with a lot of interaction such as Critical Role inherently better. But to imply that D&D can only do the former? I disagree. I've seen people literally leave the room because they were overwhelmed with the emotions their PC would be feeling.

 

[Oofta]

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.


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.

I understand that different games have different goals. The goal of D&D to me is not necessarily to explore your inner self. We can do a lot, there are times when I'm uncertain how my PC would react and I roll a dice to think about it, but I want complete agency over my PC. Which yes, includes deciding what their sexual orientation is.

As far as controlling emotions and letting the emotions control you, that's part and parcel of role playing to me. Do I think my PC would lose it in this situation? Maybe they do, even though I personally would not. To a certain degree role playing without external restrictions lets me explore different personalities; for me it let me give my position to be more assertive in certain situations. That would not have happened if it had been externally induced.

There has been a lot written about D&D and it's benefits for socialization, see this. For me, it's beneficial because I was the one putting myself into someone else's shoes. Not the game, me. Having the game tell me who my PC was would have lessened that. YMMV.

 

[tetrasodium]

Not only do we not have full control over our emotions, but we are often unaware of our subconscious decision-making, and we invent "rational" explanations for our choices after the fact.

Which is why I keep scratching my head over this "what the character would do" thing. Basically any behavior could qualify, and if we're telling an adventure story often the highly improbable options can be the most interesting ones.

No offense but regarding your whole post, especially the head scratching bit I have a thing or two to say...

Spoiler

Yiu expected an insult here for obvious reasons.... Much like "I'm a roleplayer and it's what my character would do" the words "no offense but" are almost exclusively used before going beyond the pale. There is a difference between "improbable" actions and the actions of someone the group would never have allowed to join to join them or the actions of the newest corpse to be left in the wake of a standard murderhobo party. The only reason that doesn't happen is because said character is played by someone who is a friend of the players at the table. you might enjoy things if you are playing that guy at the table, but rarely does the rest of the group sign up to be that guy's therapist/probation officer/apologetic guardian fixing a broken individual and cleaning up their messes. The thing about "its what my character would do" is that like the kender it knows no limits and will force the rest of the group to switch to unwilling probation officer at the drop of the hat. Sometimes that extends to the point where one or more players at the table are forced to abandon any hope of their character being anything but. Thsts made worse because the party of adventurers who go around murdering problems won't murder thst guy in his sleep and if those unwilling probation officers ever actually do so in frustration the players are painted in a bad light because.... "I'm a roleplayer and its what my character would do" never made anything acceptable & just served as a way of deflecting consequence while daring the gm & rest of the table to somehow cleanup the mess or derail things to the point of packing up. If the "improbable" action needs to be prefaced with "I'm a roleplayer..." its probably not fun for anyone else

 

[Bill Zebub]

No offense but regarding your whole post, especially the head scratching bit I have a thing or two to say...

Spoiler

Yiu expected an insult here for obvious reasons.... Much like "I'm a roleplayer and it's what my character would do" the words "no offense but" are almost exclusively used before going beyond the pale. There is a difference between "improbable" actions and the actions of someone the group would never have allowed to join to join them or the actions of the newest corpse to be left in the wake of a standard murderhobo party. The only reason that doesn't happen is because said character is played by someone who is a friend of the players at the table. you might enjoy things if you are playing that guy at the table, but rarely does the rest of the group sign up to be that guy's therapist/probation officer/apologetic guardian fixing a broken individual and cleaning up their messes. The thing about "its what my character would do" is that like the kender it knows no limits and will force the rest of the group to switch to unwilling probation officer at the drop of the hat. Sometimes that extends to the point where one or more players at the table are forced to abandon any hope of their character being anything but. Thsts made worse because the party of adventurers who go around murdering problems won't murder thst guy in his sleep and if those unwilling probation officers ever actually do so in frustration the players are painted in a bad light because.... "I'm a roleplayer and its what my character would do" never made anything acceptable & just served as a way of deflecting consequence while daring the gm & rest of the table to somehow cleanup the mess or derail things to the point of packing up. If the "improbable" action needs to be prefaced with "I'm a roleplayer..." its probably not fun for anyone else

I had a little bit of trouble parsing this, but I think what you're saying is that my argument seems to justify bad player behavior.

Is that correct?

 

[Aldarc]

If you ever want to discuss the actual game, let me know. Buh-bye.

Which game?

I understand that different games have different goals. The goal of D&D to me is not necessarily to explore your inner self. We can do a lot, there are times when I'm uncertain how my PC would react and I roll a dice to think about it, but I want complete agency over my PC. Which yes, includes deciding what their sexual orientation is.

It seems like having "complete agency" in the way that it is often discussed in D&D is less about agency and more about conceptual authorship.

As far as controlling emotions and letting the emotions control you, that's part and parcel of role playing to me. Do I think my PC would lose it in this situation? Maybe they do, even though I personally would not. To a certain degree role playing without external restrictions lets me explore different personalities; for me it let me give my position to be more assertive in certain situations. That would not have happened if it had been externally induced.

I think that external restrictions and pressures are precisely what let me explore different personalities because they may push me in mind spaces or situations that I would not necessarily have discovered or explored on my own through roleplaying, even if I claim to be in the head space of my character. When I accept that my character concept may change as a result of the mechanics, my character feels as if they become more fluid, dynamic, fleshed-out, and organic.

There has been a lot written about D&D and it's benefits for socialization, see this. For me, it's beneficial because I was the one putting myself into someone else's shoes. Not the game, me. Having the game tell me who my PC was would have lessened that. YMMV.

I don't see how there are some how less benefits for socialization simply because social mechanics exist in a game or even how this is somehow a unique phenomenon to D&D as opposed to roleplaying games in general.

 

[Xetheral]

When I accept that my character concept may change as a result of the mechanics, my character feels as if they become more fluid, dynamic, fleshed-out, and organic.

Interesting! For me it's the opposite: when my character concept may change as a result of mechanics, my character feels disjointed, superficial, and artificial.

 

[Bill Zebub]

Interesting! For me it's the opposite: when my character concept may change as a result of mechanics, my character feels disjointed, superficial, and artificial.

In other words: we each experience the game in our own way.

I know some people feel more immersed in their character if they ask the DM, and possibly roll dice, to determine whether their character "knows" something (e.g., trolls & fire). Doing that makes me feel disconnected from my character. And given that difference, it puzzles me why some people want to insist that one version is superior roleplaying. It's a bit like arguing which is the best ice cream flavor.

(Butter pecan, by the way.)

 

[hawkeyefan]

Interesting! For me it's the opposite: when my character concept may change as a result of mechanics, my character feels disjointed, superficial, and artificial.

It's fine you feel that way and prefer for the game to function that way...but why does it feel disjointed or artificial to have a character who is influenced by external factors? That's how actual people function.

(Butter pecan, by the way.)

This is absolute lunacy.

 

[Xetheral]

In other words: we each experience the game in our own way.

I know some people feel more immersed in their character if they ask the DM, and possibly roll dice, do determine whether their character "knows" something (e.g., trolls & fire). Doing that makes me feel disconnected from my character. And given that difference, it puzzles me why some people want to insist that one version is superior roleplaying. It's a bit like arguing which is the best ice cream flavor.

(Butter pecan, by the way.)

For specificity, my decision to 'like' this post should not be construed as an endorsement of your opinion on ice cream flavors.