D&D 5E Respect Mah Authoritah: Thoughts on DM and Player Authority in 5e

[Umbran]

The issue is not whether the PCs can win in the game. They can. It's that there is no traditional win condition for the players and DM. They only have the non-traditional, "Hey, we all win if we have fun!" which is true. We all do win if we have fun, but we haven't won D&D.

Exactly. Perhaps more generally - Win conditions are not intrinsic to the role playing game form. They may be worked into or layered onto particular examples - You can write an RPG with a win condition, or your players can choose conditions that they will feel mean they succeeded at what they wanted to accomplish, and so they win. But RPGs, in general, don't require this.

On the subject of stacked success/failure situations... D&D does have these, but... (there's always a but)...

...even if there are short term success/failure situations does not mean there's a win/loss of the game as a whole. Or, if there is, the stack does not necessarily determine the overall win - one can succeed at a stack of tactical challenges, but still lose the overarching strategic conflict.

But moreover, stacked success/fail situations are common, but not actually required for an RPG, in that conflict resolution mechanics do not have to resolve whether the character succeeds or fails. They can instead resolve the cost or repercussions of success or failure. The game then becomes less about "can I succeed" and more about "am I willing to pay the price of success".

 

[overgeeked]

Let's take it out of D&D and look at something that is arguably very similar on a functional level. Do MMOs like World of Warcraft and Final Fantasy 14 have win conditions?

For those, the only winning move is not to play.

 

[Malmuria]

I think the language around winning and losing seen in most traditional roleplaying game texts is harmful to the culture of play. Basically it has created a culture of play where developing skill as a player and like trying hard to accomplish the game's objectives is looked down on. All the attendant shame (meta gaming, optimization, etc.) that gets thrown on players for actually looking at and playing the game as like a game does a great disservice to this community and it starts with that language around winning and losing.

This is really helpful in establishing the stakes for why using or not using certain terminology matters in how games are presented--thank you. I disagree, in that I think employing a language of winning causes more confused play expectations than it resolves, but I can see your point. I prefer games to include language that qualifies "winning" and includes more neutral language (goal, objective, etc), as in the CoC example that I quoted. It's not that games ought to excise all language related to winning, but clarifying the non zero-sum expectation is helpful.

Helpful, in my experience, for a few reasons. One, it helps avoid adversarial play. Now, certainly characters might be working at cross purposes with each other. But, this should be done with some intentionality and OOC boundaries or it results in dysfunction (as the group is incapable of acting together) or, worse, bad feelings at the table. Two, I've experienced players trying to win leading to overly cautious play. It's hard to convince a player to "fall in love with danger" or to "play their character like a stolen car" if, in game terms, they are taking a risk-adverse strategy. Finally, as a GM, one might be tempted to drive play towards resolving a predetermined "win condition" rather than being more open to the evolving goals of the group as a whole or each player individually. The starting goal might be, "defeat the vampire Strahd," but that might not be where the party ends up, as I tried to demonstrate above.

As a side note, I've never been at a table with optimizers, but I have read stories of people being shamed for having less-than-optimal characters, and it's a constant topic of discussion on 5e forums.

 

[pemerton]

What's actually being argued against here? That roleplaying games have player objectives that do not neatly correspond to naturalistic play? If we want to have that argument let's have that one instead of a semantic one. Is it under dispute that D&D expects players to strive to complete adventures or Call of Cthulhu expects players to strive to solve mysteries? That Burning Wheel does not expect players to fight for their character's beliefs?

I'm speaking to player goals here. Not character ones.

Burning Wheel is an interesting one. I think there are goals: both the relatively "high level" and metagame one of having an RPG experience where your PC is put under pressure and you have to push back as a player, bringing both your mechanical resources and the fiction to bear; and the ones established by the fiction and stated in in-fiction terms, which will shape your actual action declarations, like (eg) I will liberate my homeland.

I'm not sure there are "win conditions" in the same way White Plume Mountain obviously has those, because achieving those in-fiction goals doesn't necessarily count as a win - the whole design of the game supports pyrrhic victories, a bitter taste in the mouth at getting what you (thought you) wanted, etc - while pursuing those "high level" metagame goals is more like an ongoing process than a concrete moment of attainment.

But there are adaptations possible. In the Adventure Burner, which predates Torchbearer (but maybe not Burning THACO), the idea of "micro-dungeoneering" is introduced. In this case players are encouraged to write Beliefs that correspond to win conditions of beating the dungeon (eg I will recover Thelon's Orb). A similar approach to mystery RPGing would probably be possible - I'm sure that Wises and Assess actions could be adapted to that sort of game, with a bit of thought and cleverness.

Anyway, I fully agree that trying to differentiate RPGs from other sorts of gameplay by talking about "no goal but fun" as opposed to focusing on the particular processes of play, the expectations of play, etc seems needlessly obscurantist.

 

[Ovinomancer]

Exactly. Perhaps more generally - Win conditions are not intrinsic to the role playing game form. They may be worked into or layered onto particular examples - You can write an RPG with a win condition, or your players can choose conditions that they will feel mean they succeeded at what they wanted to accomplish, and so they win. But RPGs, in general, don't require this.

On the subject of stacked success/failure situations... D&D does have these, but... (there's always a but)...

...even if there are short term success/failure situations does not mean there's a win/loss of the game as a whole. Or, if there is, the stack does not necessarily determine the overall win - one can succeed at a stack of tactical challenges, but still lose the overarching strategic conflict.

But moreover, stacked success/fail situations are common, but not actually required for an RPG, in that conflict resolution mechanics do not have to resolve whether the character succeeds or fails. They can instead resolve the cost or repercussions of success or failure. The game then becomes less about "can I succeed" and more about "am I willing to pay the price of success".

You've moved the pea, but haven't actually changed anything. Win conditions still exist when determining costs, because, at some point, costs mount or are unpayable for a given desired outcome and you don't get it. And, getting an outcome more cheaply is still a win.

This is trying to invent some new category of what's actually happening that can be named just slightly differently and then treated as a completely different thing. I'm not sure why? Why is it important to you, personally, that RPGs do not have win conditions, stacked/layered/overlapping/macro/micro/whatever?

 

[pemerton]

@Xetheral, what @Ovinomancer has said is basically true for me. I don't really understand what your spectrum is a spectrum of. I could try and offer some possible interpretations which would need to use the concepts of background and situational authority; I realise that you might think this is begging the question in my favour.

In referring to the provision of/availability of options, you seem to be talking about the process of establishing situations. In both a sandbox and a liner game, these result from pre-authored backstory. But in a sandbox the players engage with that backstory in a particular way to "activate" the situations latent in the backstory; whereas in linear play the GM presents the backstory and particular pre-authored situations "all at once", as it were.

So the only spectrum I can see in the neighbourhood is the spectrum of occasions in which situation is generated via the sandbox-type approach as opposed to the linear-type approach. I personally don't see how this is a spectrum in any way beyond just a count of the proportions of, or ratio of, such instances, but that is perhaps a secondary matter.

 

[hawkeyefan]

As a side note, I've never been at a table with optimizers, but I have read stories of people being shamed for having less-than-optimal characters, and it's a constant topic of discussion on 5e forums.

I see this in my longtime game group. Never to the level of shaming, but they definitely operate with the expectation that each player will build their character effectively and toward some general idea of being a part of a team. They lean heavily on the idea of roles…tank, striker, etc. It’s usually not explicitly stated, but it’s like an ever present vibe.

Make no mistake….this vibe is born of the desire to win. To be effective at the game and to contribute to the group’s success.

Take that same group and put them in a game of Blades in the Dark or Spire, and that mindset falls away. They’re still experienced gamers capable of crafting effective characters, but those games shift the focus just enough that the idea of winning….or at least the focus on it…just takes a backseat.

Those games give players far more narrative authority. Is this shift in focus a product of that? I can’t say for sure. Or at least, I can’t say for sure that’s the sole reason. But I definitely think they’re related.

 

[pemerton]

I see this in my longtime game group. Never to the level of shaming, but they definitely operate with the expectation that each player will build their character effectively and toward some general idea of being a part of a team. They lean heavily on the idea of roles…tank, striker, etc. It’s usually not explicitly stated, but it’s like an ever present vibe.

Make no mistake….this vibe is born of the desire to win. To be effective at the game and to contribute to the group’s success.

Take that same group and put them in a game of Blades in the Dark or Spire, and that mindset falls away.

I find that these issues of how play is approached can reflect both system and player inclination and aptitude.

In 4e D&D, all my players were looking for ways to be mechanically effective. The game cries out for that sort of attitude - otherwise the intricacies of its PC build system, and how that feeds into action resolution, become pointless and even probably counterproductive.

In Classic Traveller, on the other hand, PC gen is random. The players play what they rolled. That said, the most successful optimiser in 4e (my friend who is a financial planner who specialises in optimisation mathematics) does push harder with his Traveller PC than any of the others (he is also the one who blew up the trial with a concealed grenade).

Probably his least optimised play is actually Prince Valiant, and I think that's because of all the systems we've been playing over the past several years it combines a low scope for mechanical optimisation (skills go from zero ranks to six, and that means exactly what it says on the tin - roll that many dice for your checks - and there are no feats, spells etc to make things more intricate and "exploitable") with a higher focus on (melo)drama than on procedural success.

I think I've posted before that his BW PCs advance at a furious pace because he plays in aggressive author stance, declaring the actions that will yield the checks that will net him the advancement he wants and retroactively motivating his PC to want to perform those actions; whereas I advance a bit more slowly because I prefer to play in fairly intense actor stance, relying on my Beliefs and the actions that flow from them to interact with my PC build to generate the requisite checks. The system is sufficiently well-designed that my reliance isn't futile; but my hope is no match for his dedicated pursuit!

Absolutely. It seems that based on the few responses that people are mostly okay with such abilities conceptually (with the exception of @Lanefan ) but that they expect them to be either smaller in scope or perhaps limited in use in some way.

<snip>

I personally quite like things like Rustic Hospitality and Natural Explorer. I like when the players can just say what their character does, and under the right circumstances, it just happens. They just win succeed.

<snip>

But your Lolth example is interesting given much of the conversation here in the thread. Let’s say that a Wish spell could erase Lolth from existence. I feel like most folks here would object to that. But why? Hard to imagine what issue they may take if they are also arguing that there’s no end to D&D. So Lolth’s gone….just do more D&D.

In Prince Valiant, players can earn Storyteller Certificates from the GM, by doing stuff that the GM finds impressive and/or amusing. And these can be spent for fiat victories (within various specified categories of effect, but that includes Slay a Foe in Combat).

The fictional positioning has to support the use of the certificate. So when one of the knights - the one who is weakest in combat - found himself in the waters of the Black Sea fighting a "dragon" (ie a super-big crocodile) he had to succeed at an appropriate Agility check to position himself to stab the dragon with his spear before he could then spend his certificate to auto-kill it.

It's the second time that player has used a certificate to perform an impressive "kill steal", with the result that he has a reputation as a knight which in a sense far outruns his baseline skill, but is the result of his luck and guts (ie the way the certificate effect has been narrated).

Upthread I mentioned that I think 5e D&D is ambiguous about how the Rustic Hospitality and Natural Explorer abilities are meant to work. I think the explanation of the Prince Valiant certificates is much clearer - these are auto-wins for a particular challenge. Whereas the D&D abilities are explained in terms of task success but leave open what that might mean in "meta", dynamics-of-play-at-the-table terms.

The Wish spell, on the other hand, is far less ambiguous in this respect - and as a result has all its legacy baggage! I think the spells somewhat easy repeatability has explained some of this, but not all of it - and in 5e that repeatability is rather curtailed. As you imply/allude to in the last couple of sentences I've quoted, a full explanation would have to engage with what is considered a fair approach to winning, and what is considered an exploitative workaround, in D&D play . . .

 

[Lanefan]

@prabe,

Can you redo that analysis of @Manbearcat's post using the term "goal" instead of "win condition?" Would your examples change? If so, what's the difference in that you see between completing a goal and winning a goal? Is this just a semantics issue?

In my case they all would change, as completing a goal is not necessarily an end state but winning is.

 

[pemerton]

How is winning an end state? If I win a trick in bridge, that doesn't necessarily end the hand, or the rubber.

If I win an "exchange" (I'm not sure if this is the right technical term) in a fighting sport like boxing or karate, that doesn't necessarily end the bout.

Etc.