D&D General Railroads, Illusionism, and Participationism

[Lyxen]

People have answered, you're just not listening. You can easily do this by establishing the fiction that this guy is a super-genius clearly. This already strongly constrains the action-declaration space because the established fiction means that this guy doesn't fall for easy gambits. And you've established that this guy is playing hard and well, so you've foreshadowed the danger. Then you can make very hard moves on the players for any failures they make with this established. I don't have to prep anything, or lie, or deceive, just reveal new fiction when called for that's aligned with the resolution process and the established ficiton.

Doesn't work for me, I try to live by "show, don't tell". Telling everyone that some NPC is an evil genius only to have him behave like an idiot and be continuously outsmarted does not make for good verisimilitude.

How this works specifically is going to depend on the game. In 5e, for instance, I could very easily just say that Super-Genius-Guy has an ability called "superior intellect" that imposes disadvantage on all checks that try to manipulate, deceive, or coerce SGG. Then, when actions are attempted that engage this trait, and fail, I deploy painful consequences to represent exactly how, in this case, SGG planned for exactly this contingency. On a success, the players actually get on over. This lets the players engage the fiction directly, in a thematic way, without me having to craft a web of Force and Illusionism or actually pre-guess their moves, and let's players stack resources for important actions, which is thematically appropriate. What they don't have to do is solve my prepared puzzle.

This is a very technical answer, really not what I'm looking for, it's not my type of game.

In other games, this is even easier because there's already mechanical structures in place for this.

The answer that I'm looking for is not in terms of mechanics but in terms of story and plot.

Fun can be achieved in many ways, so stating fun is the reason to do a specific thing is immediately obvious as a bad argument. It can be equally fun to do a different thing. So, fun is just not a reasoned answer to the question nor is it sufficient justification. Anyone can deploy this answer for any argument.

Fun is obviously relative to your audience. What I'm telling you here, is that I'm looking for the maximum fun of my players, who are don't find technicalities fun or actually what they are looking for in a roleplaying game (again, in line with the 5e general design).

 

[pemerton]

And praytell, how are you improvising the intrigues of supra-geniuses like Orcus and the Raven Queen or even their minions ? The answer is you don't if you're not at least a bit devious, otherwise you can of course play a game which is heavily focussed about combat like the examples that you have provided.

Because I don't make the claim that I'm an (evil) genius, I can't have all the ideas that they would have, or keep track of what they are doing. What I do is collaborate with my players in a sort of hive mind to get there, and use their ideas as well.

But surely, and obviously, you can, so you are multiple evil geniuses rolled into one...

<snip>

when I'm keeping tracks of the actions of dozens of arch-devils and Demon Princes, not to mention Rakshasa, Night Hags, Ultro- and Arcana-daemons, archmages, etc., all of which are devious and scheming against each other and against the PCs, I'll use every trick I know of to create verisimilitude, and make the players feel the threat of all that scheming.

You make a lot of assumptions.

Here's an example of a session involving the Raven Queen. The map was drawn up in advance of the session, sitting on my living room floor. From memory, it involved 4 or so sheets of A4 paper. The "key" - that is, the descriptions of the mausoleum like the descriptions of the murals and statutes, grave goods, visions in pools, erased names on the walls, etc - was mostly made up during play, except for the riddle which (as I say) I had prepared during my train commutes.

What is her intrigue? To become divine ruler of the world. How is she achieving it? By taking over the domains of defeated gods. How do I depict this? Well, in play the PCs helped her take over the domain of winter-in-the-Feywild, by subduing the Frost Giants of the Feywild and obtaining their allegiance, and then defeating the Prince of Frost.

You don't fully state the techniques that you are using as a GM, but as best I can tell you are using fairly standard techniques that I would associate with Plansescape (say, a module like Dead Gods) or with some CoC scenarios: lots of backstory pre-authored by the GM; lots of adjudication of outcomes of declared actions (including, but not only, investigation-type actions) by reference to as-yet-unrevealed backstory; etc.

I am also using fairly standard techniques, but ones that I would associate with Maelstrom Storytelling, Burning Wheel and Apocalypse/Dungeon World. (I'm speaking in general terms; these systems have their own nuances and significant points of distinction.) These include prioritising situation over backstory; and using consequence narration as the trigger to introduce new fiction, modulating that fiction depending on whether the consequence is a success or a failure - very roughly, on a success either I narrate something the player was hoping for, or make (what from an AW perspective would be called) a "soft move", foreshadowing an unhappy possibility but one which the player, via the play of their PC, might have a chance to stop; on a failure, on the other hand, I narrate something which is definitely not something the player would want to be the case.

The only thing that I'm saying is that in and of themselves, they are not bad or evil

I don't think anyone in this thread has said they are bad or evil. I and some others have said we don't use them. Using "devious tricks" is your prerogative. Not using them is ours.

a DM using them is not a bad GM, nor does it imperil his friendship or whatever rule of the social contract.

<snip>

just because the PC make the choice to do a heist on Graz'zt domain does not mean that I will let that happen because, like it or not, there is an uber-arc and plots and scenarios and ideas and hooks to manage, and it might cause all of that to crash down, including other parts which are dear to the PCs as well.

It seems to me that this depends on the GM, the friends, and the social contract. I don't think it makes sense to treat anyone's own experience as universal.

Upthread I posted a description of some play in my Classic Traveller game. At some tables this would be considered unreasonable play: a player having his PC murder a whole group of NPCs, and killing another player's secondary PC in the process; me, as GM, having a friendly NPC undertake medical experimentation that (i) results in a threat - an Alien (TM) that nearly killed some characters on the starship when it went ballistic, and (ii) is now being carried out on one of those victim characters, who is a borderline PC/NPC who sits in the "position" of another player and is the girlfriend/friend-with-benefits of one of that player's main PCs.

At our table it was not considered unreasonable, although some strong reactions were provoked - especially by the murder.

Your description of "not . . . let[ting[ that happen" and "an uber-arc and plots and scenarios" tends to confirm my impression of the sorts of techniques you are using and the sort of approach you adopt. I am relatively familiar with that approach: the texts that advocate it (eg Planescape and other 2nd ed AD&D texts; at least some CoC material; 1990s White Wolf material), and the sort of play it produces. I have no desire to engage in it. At my table it would be considered unreasonable.

What I can tell you I find really, really , REALLY bad is players deciding to slam the door on a DM's face for a bit of railroading. That is humanly absolutely unjustifiable and the mark of a level of entitlement that none of them members and GMs of our groups would suffer.

Well, I guess it's good for those railroading GMs that there are players like you who want what they're offering!

When I play - as opposed to GM - which in the past several years has been in Burning Wheel games, my friend who GMs applies the standard techniques and principles of Burning Wheel, and does not railroad. We have a good time doing our thing. I don't think that fact is adversely affecting you in any way.

If I'm a beginner DM offering to run "Keep on the Borderlands", which is a basic a module as ever written, and do it out of the box, what makes you think I feel up to improvising a heist in the nearby town on the spot ?

You seem to be referring to @Hussar's game. Was the GM in that game a beginner?

When I had not been GMing for too many years, and was still a teenager, I used KotB for an all-thieves campaign. The PCs didn't do a great deal in the Caves, but they did get up to hijinks in the Keep, including investigating an evil cult - as I'm sure you know KotB has a sub-theme of cult activity. I improvised all of that, using the sorts of techniques I've described above in this thread. It was some of my most successful and enjoyable AD&D play.

it's about fighting in your case, with fights lasting a full evening (again, this from your summaries).

<snip>

And it will make them feel extremely good when they outscheme their foes, or when they best them through sheer heroism or deviousness on their parts, because they know that they were not underplayed as just brutes to fight in a physical combat like Orcus or Ygorl in your campaigns.

<snip>

listening in on the plotting and discussions of the PC and building on this makes sure that I'm listening to them.

You are a very judgemental poster. You also have a tendency to generalise on a thin evidence base.

I don't really know what you think is the difference between besting them through sheer heroism and fighting in physical combat. But I'll put that to one side. When I GM 4e D&D, I treat combat as the ultimate crucible of conflict, because that's the sort of game it is. When Orcus was ultimately defeated by the PCs in my game, that was a fight. In order to set up the fight on their own terms, the players - as their PCs - undertook the following bits of deviousness. First, one of them sealed the Abyss off from the rest of the cosmos:

It then came to the drow sorcerer's turn. In an email a few days ago the player had told me that he had a plan to seal off the Abyssal rift created by the tearing of the Demonwebs and the killing of Lolth, that relied upon the second law of thermodynamics. Now was the time for him to explain it. It took quite a while at the table (20 minutes? Maybe more? There was a lot of interjection and discussion). Here is the summary version:

* The second law of thermodynamics tells us that time and entropy are correlated: increases in entropy from moment to moment are indicative of the arrow of time;​

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* Hence, when entropy reaches its maximum state - and so cannot increase - time has stopped;​

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* Hence, if an effect that would normally last until the end of the encounter could be turned into an effect of ultimate chaos (entropy), time would stop in respect of the effect and it would not come to an end.​

So far, so good, but how is this helping to seal off the Abyss?

* Earlier in the encounter the sorcerer had created a Cloak of Winter Storm which, using an elemental swapping item, was actually a zone of thunder (larger than normal because created while a Huge primordial) that caused shift 1 sq which, through various feat combos, was actually teleportation;​

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* If this could be extended in size, and converted into a zone of ultimate entropy instead of just a zone of thunder, then it would not come to an end (for the reasons given above);​

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* Furthermore, anyone who approached it would slow down (as time came to a stop with the increase in entropy) and, if they hit it, be teleported back 1 square;​

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* As to how a zone of elemental thunder might be converted into a zone of ultimate entropy, that's what a chaos sorcerer is for - especially as, at that time, the Slaad lord of Entropy, Ygorl, was trapped inside the Crystal of Ebon Flame and so control over entropy was arguably unclaimed by any other entity and hence available to be claimed by the sorcerer PC.​

But couldn't someone who wanted to pass through this entropic barrier just teleport from one side to the other?

* On his turn, the sorcerer therefore spent his move action to stand from prone (I can't now remember why he had started the session prone), and used his minor action to activate his Cloud of Darkness - through which only he can see;​

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* He then readied his standard action to help the invoker/wizard perform the mighty feat of Arcana that would merge the darkness and the zone into a visually and physically impenetrable entropic field, through which nothing could pass unless able to teleport without needing line of sight.​

Unfortunately, the invoker/wizard wasn't ready to help with this plan, and had doubts about its chaotic aspect. On his turn, he instead rescued the paladin and fighter PCs who had become trapped in the Abyssal rift (by casting Tide of the First Storm to wash them back up onto the top of the PCs' Thundercloud Tower).

<snip>

The drow's turn then came around. He used his move action to fly the Tower up and out of the two zones (darkness and thunder). He then used a minor action to cast Stretch Spell - as written, a range-boosting effect but it seemed fitting, in spirit, to try to extend and compress zones to create a barrier of ultimate, impenetrable entropy. And then he got ready to make his Arcana check as a standard action.

Now INT is pretty much a dump stat for everyone in the party but the invoker/wizard. In the case of the sorcerer it is 12 - so with training and level, he has an Arcana bonus of +20. So when I stated that the DC was 41, it looked a bit challenging. (It was always going to be a Hard check - if any confirmation was needed, the Rules Compendium suggests that manipulating the energies of a magical phenomenon is a Hard Arcana improvisation.)

So he started looking around for bonuses. As a chaos mage, he asked whether he could burn healing surges for a bonus on the roll - giving of his very essence. I thought that sounded reasonable, and so allowed 4 surges for +8. Unfortunately he had only 2 surges left, so the other half of the bonus had to come from taking damage equal to his bloodied value - which was OK, as he was currently unbloodied.

He scraped another +2 from somewhere (I can't remember now), brining the roll needed down to 11. The dice was rolled - and came up 18! So he succeeded in converting his zones of darkness and thunder into a compressed, extended, physically and visually impenetrable entropic barrier, in which time doesn't pass (and hence the effects don't end), sealing off the Abyss at its 66th layer.

The unfortunate side effect, as was clarified between me (as GM) and the player before the action was declared, was that - as the effects never end - so he can never recharge his Cloak of Darkness encounter power or his Cloak of the Winter Storm daily.

A modest price to pay for cementing the defeat of Lolth and sealing off the bottom of the Abyss from the rest of creation.

Then they deviously found a secret way into Orcus's throne room on Thanatos, by stealing the secret from Vecna after prompting Vecna to steal it from a bound Aspect of Orcus:

they wanted to take an extended rest before taking the fight to Orcus.

They rested up, and in this time it also became clear how much the sorcerer had changed: not only had he lost his Cloud of Darkness power (becoming less drow-ish and more elven!) but his demonskins sloughed off - no longer a Demonskin Adept drawing power from the Abyss in order to defeat Lolth, he has become a Voice of Thunder in the service of Corellon; and the eyes on his Robe of Eyes (which protected him from his Paragon Path feature of becoming blinded when delivering a critical hit) had permanently opened like iridescent peacock feathers - it was now a Robe of Scintillating Colours (from Mordenkainen's Magnificent Emporium). Having lost the variable resistance feature from his former paragon path he now had to roll to determine his chaotic resistance, and got a necrotic result! - thereupon declaring that there are to be no more rests (and, hence, no more rerolls of that resistance) until Orcus is dead!

The PCs (and players) then pondered how to get to Thanatos, on the 333rd layer of the Abyss. The invoker/wizard remembered that they had an Aspect of Orcus trapped back in the duergar hold that had been invaded by demons, and thought that it might have information about a secret way in.

The PCs therefore teleported to Phaevorul (the nearest portal that they knew) and travelled through the Underdark to the duergar hold. This provided a chance to introduce a bit of colour illustrating the effects that their godslaying had had upon the world: with Torog dead the Underdark had reverted to roiling chaos, and in combination with the death of Lolth dead this meant that the drow civilisation had virtually collapsed.

In the small skill challenge to travel to the duergar hold and deal with the Aspect:

* The wizard/invoker maintained the PCs' phantom steeds (with a +40-something Arcana bonus this was an auto-success that didn't need to be rolled for);​

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* The player of the ranger-cleric made a successful Dungeoneering check, aided by the dwarf, to steer a path through the now everchanging, roiling Underdark;​

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* The sorcerer made a successful Diplomacy check (he had retrained Insight to Diplomacy and succeeded against a Hard DC) to persuade the wandering and raving drow that now was the time to return to the surface and dance once more under the stars, as they had with their elven kin in the times of old;​

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* Once they arrived at the duergar hold, the paladin made a successful Diplomacy check to persuade the duergar to let them gain access to the trapped Aspect of Orcus so that they could take the fight to the Abyss;​

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* The duergar - who had always felt comfortable dealing with a fellow bearer of diabolic taint (the paladin is a tiefling) - explained that Asmodeus was now calling upon them to join him in an assault upon the Abyss, and sought advice as to what they should do;​

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* The paladin cautioned them against becoming bound to devils, instancing the downfall of the tieflings as an indicator of the possible costs and pointing to the fact that the drown were now freed from Lolth's yoke - I asked, to clarify, whether he was trying to persuade the duergar not to go along with Asmodeus, and he said yes, so I called for the Diplomacy check against a Hard DC;​

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* The invoker/wizard indicated that he would help, and made a successful check as he cautioned the duergar against being manipulated by Asmodeus into being his fodder in a futile war; but together with the paladin player's rather dismal roll this wasn't quite enough (from memory, 6 (roll) +32 (skill) +2 (aid another) for 40 rather than 41);​

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* There was then a brief discussion in which I reminded the player of the invoker/wizard of some backstory he had forgotten, namely, that the reason Levistus and Bane had let him be resurrected (back in mid-Paragon) was on the condition that he help prevent Asmodeus invading the Abyss and thereby risking a spread of chaos;​

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* Back in the game rather than the metagame, the PC could tell that his imp was itching to speak;​

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* So the player spent his action point to let his imp speak to the duergar, thereby giving an extra bonus to make the roll succeed - mechanically, this was the imp granting its +4 Diplomacy bonus vs devils and their friends (from the invoker/wizard PC's variant Devil's Pawn theme) to the paladin; and in the fiction, the imp explained to the duergar that it was Levistus who, of the archdevils, had the backs of mortals, and they should not let themselves be tricked by Asmodeus into a foolish sacrifice;​

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* The players weren't entirely sure that switching the duergar from Asmodeus to Levistus was maximum progress - the dwarf fighter/cleric was mumbling "What about Moradin?" somewhere in the background; but at least Asmodeus will not have his duergar army when he assaults the Plain of One Thousand Portals;​

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* Attention now turned to the Aspect of Orcus - it had been trapped by channelling power from Vecna, and the player of the invoker/wizard had already pointed out that Vecna would be alerted if the PCs tried to steal secrets from it; now, a successful Religion check (made easily against a Hard DC, with a +40 bonus) allowed the invoker/wizard to make contact with Vecna and ask him to rip information of a secret entrance into Thanatos from the mind of the Aspect;​

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* Vecna indicated a willingness to do so, but only on conditions - that the trapped Aspect of Vecna (whom the invoker/wizard and the paladin had bound drawing upon the power of the Raven Queen) be released;​

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* The invoker/wizard would only do this if the paladin agreed, and the latter was not keen; I told the players that with a successful Insight check vs a Hard DC the invoker/wizard could read the secret from Vecna without needing to be overtly told - so the PC said to Vecna "We'll find another way" and then rolled the check, which missed by 1, but then he activated his Memory of One Thousand Lifetimes and rolled a 6, which was enough for a success and, he hoped, enough to mean that Vecna may not know that his mind had been read;​

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* With the secret entrance into Everlost, Orcus's palace of bones on Thanatos, now acquired, all that was required was to cast the Planar Portal to teleport there: I read out to the players the description of Thanatos and the palace from the MotP, and they were glad they hadn't tried for a frontal assault; this also described Thanatos as being "inhospitable even by the standards of the Abyss", and so - although the PCs had Endure Primordial Elements up - I called for the 8th check of the skill challenge - a group Endurance vs Medium DC (ie 31);​

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* The dwarf has a +34 bonus, and so the player of the dwarf asked if he could try to shelter someone else - I said he could grant a +2 in return for facing a Hard DC (41), which he did - and he succeeded; the paladin also succeeded, as did the ranger-cleric once the bonus from the dwarf was factored in; the sorcerer failed by with an Easy success, so I docked him a healing surge; the invoker/wizard failed with a result below an Easy success, and so I rolled damage for him - about a healing surge's worth.​

The session ended there, with the PCs stepping through their portal into the secret way into Orcus's throne room. I now have to find a suitable map for this - one of the players has a copy of Bloodstone which he will loan me, and I have some maps of my own from various modules which might have something suitable.

I told the players that Orcus doesn't fail forward! - so if they win, they will be 30th level, but if they die then it will be game over at 29th. This is the culmination of 6 years of play.

As a RPGer, I find the creation of shared fiction by applying and adjudicating the action resolution rules to colourful and engaging situations to be more rewarding than pre-authoring backstory and having the players declare actions that gradually prompt the GM to reveal that backstory. I'm glad that you think listening to your players makes you a virtuous GM; I also think it's good practice, but would go further and say that I regard it as pretty much the baseline. As you can see from the various examples of play I have offered, there is little or no fiction in my games that is not either framing, having regard to what the players have had their PCs do or want them to do, or else the narration of consequences following from their action declarations for their PCs.

My preference obviously is not a universal one, but that doesn't stop it being what it is.

I trust my DMs, and I'm absolutely ready to be understanding and forgiving if something is not entirely up to my expectations. Can you say the same ?

The best GM I have ever played with on a regular basis is the one who GMs Burning Wheel for me. It is his only GMing experience. He does a very good job. I think he is a better BW GM than I am, because he is more ready to follow through with consequences and really apply pressure via his framing. I am sometimes too soft.

As I posted in another thread a couple of weeks ago, he is not perfect. I remember in an early session - maybe the first - he framed a scene that I did not find very interesting or inspiring:

the GM had framed a scene involving elves (he loves elves!). I could see what he was doing - it evoked memories of other games and sessions we'd played together - but it didn't connect to my own priorities (Beliefs, etc) for my character. So, following the advice to players set out in the rulebook, I declared an action that would reorient things - I tried to persuade the elf captain to accompany me back to my ancestral homeland so he could help me deal with the evil that festers there! I knew that I had little or no chance of winning this Duel of Wits - and that turned out to be the case! I didn't even get a compromise - but the process itself was enough to bring the game back onto its principled focus: my PC and his struggles.

I think it distorts our understanding to trot out cliches like the players only recourse is to quit the game or there is no solution to principles-violating play other than not to play with d*ckheads. I mean, of course not playing with d*ckheads is a good idea, but people violate principles all the time, in all areas of life, without being fundamentally unworthy people. (My BW GM is one of the best GMs I've known.) And there are all sorts of ways we handle that short of ragequitting!

But there are times when I have abandoned games because of poor GMing. I am not under any moral duty to spend my time in a hobby activity I am not enjoying in order to avoid mild hurt to the feelings of a relative stranger.

 

[pemerton]

I agree 100% - until something is encountered by the players - it can be changed.

<snip>

I will say, this is FAR from universal. There was a discussion a while back and there were some VERY strong opinions that once it's written down, even if not encountered by the players, - cannon (surprised me a bit, but it was not a lone opinion).

From my point of view, this is another thing which is highly relative to broader goals/expectations of play.

Consider Gygax's example dungeon in his DMG. One of the rooms provides the opportunity to find a map of part of the dungeon; but it is tricky - getting it requires the players to engage with the fiction and leverage their PCs' fictional positioning.

In this sort of gameplay, changing the prepared map-and-key is contrary to the goals of play, which have a strong puzzle-solving element. To solve a puzzle - like a crossword, or Pictionary, or Gygax's limed-over skeleton of the abbot with a scroll case that looks like just another bit of bone - the puzzle-elements themselves need to be held constant.

If the goal of play is something different - say, like the DL modules, to "be" part of an exciting story as one of the protagonists - then the appropriate GMing techniques, including attitude towards backstory, also change.

Talking about this stuff as if there's one true method that is independent of all these different approaches to RPGing makes no sense! (Of course some of us have our preferences. But that should stop us appreciating what others are trying to do, and what techniques might help them with that.)

Totally this. If the point of play is to solve the mystery. Sometimes (like in games like Apocalypse Keys) you might be solving a mystery in the fiction, but both the players and the GM know it's the other stuff surrounding it that is actually important. A lot of the games I play are like this. That's awesome too. It's when I'm confused about what we are doing.

Right. When I've run Cthulhu Dark, the PCs in the fiction are solving a mystery. But at the table no one is literally solving a mystery, because no one has established any true-but-obscure thing!

For instance, one session began with the players having created their PCs: an investigative journalist, a longshoreman and a legal secretary. I asked the player of the journalist why his PC would be heading to the docks (that seeming, at the time, to be the obvious way to get the longshoreman into play): he (the player) explained the he (the character) was investigating a financial scandal involving a shipping line. Now, in the fiction, there's a mystery! But at the table there is no extent solution to that puzzle, as the first it has even come into being as a piece of fiction is when that player narrated it!

What I do find interesting, though, is how easily - in the course of play - the fiction can take on an illusory solidity. The players declare actions that "bounce" of what has already been framed (eg they have their PCs look at documents), and I as GM narrate more stuff around that, and gradually a picture emerges - in that particular case, of a shipping line that was in financial trouble and underpaying its workers because instead of shipping valuable goods it was carrying a shoggoth in its hold from Scotland to Boston.

But as per your post upthread about not letting that illusion inform our analysis once we've stepped back from play, it would be misleading to say that anyone at our table solved the mystery of the financially troubled shipping line. Rather, we collectively, and using the processes of RPG play, established a fiction in which such a mystery arose and was solved.

This contrasts with a freeform murder mystery I ran about a year ago for my family members. In this case I did have a pre-authored mystery, with a villain, and clues to be found. I adapted a MegaTraveller scenario, which uses a starship being in jump space to achieve the sort of "closed" field of inquiry found in an Agatha Christie-style whodunnit. It turned out that the players got all the clues - I didn't hold any back, and basically provided every bit of information I could as soon as they declared an action that might yield it - but they didn't join the dots (SPOILER: the murderer was the (unrevealed) twin of one of the NPCs; the clues included the fact that the NPC had a duplicate of every outfit in her wardrobe, and had ordered two dinners.)

That was a completely different RPGing experience from Cthulhu Dark, even though both - from the perspective of what genre was the fiction - were mysteries.

 

[pemerton]

The only problem here is that unlike a "real world" mystery, which is based in hard, well, reality, a mystery scenario is a constructed fiction, whether or not the GM fudges things or applies illusionism and force, and it's possible to construct clues to lead to a perfectly logical but "wrong" conclusion (since no course of events in real-world, incontrovertible fact, occurred).

Players can be happy or not about getting what the GM intended, but really there is no right answer—because there is no really.

The analogue to this might be a crossword which - through sheer coincidence - has a different solution from the intended one. Although English is a very rich language with many different words with overlapping shades of meaning, the odds of this being the case must be pretty slim - I don't know if it has ever happened. (I know it can be done as deliberate crossword design, but that's a different sort of case.)

The relationship between clues and solution in a RPG whodunnit are probably more loose than the typical crossword, and so there is more room for slippage. How much room, and how badly this might spoil the play experience, seems like a contingent matter. In the freeform scenario I ran - mentioned just upthread - the players seemed content that I had presented a fair suite of clues and that the failure to join the dots to a twin was on them. But there can be no guarantees!

 

[Lyxen]

You make a lot of assumptions.

And absolutely all of the correct, actually, and confirmed by every single example you post.

Here's an example of a session involving the Raven Queen. The map was drawn up in advance of the session, sitting on my living room floor. From memory, it involved 4 or so sheets of A4 paper. The "key" - that is, the descriptions of the mausoleum like the descriptions of the murals and statutes, grave goods, visions in pools, erased names on the walls, etc - was mostly made up during play, except for the riddle which (as I say) I had prepared during my train commutes.

This confirms that your games are 95% technical (even in your summary you include the name of the powers used and the ability scores and the DCs...). There is no intrigue in there, it's a fairly straightforward dungeon exploration - a nice one for sure, but still a dungeon - but there are barely any NPCs to talk to.

My games (and in general the games run at our table) look nothing like this. There is in general no map, no dungeon complex for sure. I mostly have a list of active NPCs and a situation (and at this stage of the campaign, the PCs have armies under their command, devils, daemons, undead, as well as devil assassins that the bhaalspawn of the group is trying to have betray to join her quest to the Throne of Blood). Currently the PCs have brought a vague coalition of devils, daemons, night hag, necromancer, devilish hobgoblins and undead (after recruiting them one by one, in the order of their choice, using some as levers to others, smashing some enemies as a way to reinforce their alliance and intimidating others, etc.) to try to break a deadlock where forces of Zariel and Bel are holding an army of Graz'zt in the middle, but both armies are on their own inferior to the demon army, although they could probably vanquish it together. And that's all they have, except for the fact that the Warlock of the group has decided to please her master Mephisto by doing a ritual right in the town where the demons are besieged (the other PCs are a bit dubious and quite afraid of the result)...

So last time the PCs first held a war council with their "generals", all of whom have different aims, most of them nefarious. Then decided to take a very selective escort to negotiate with the demons, taking along the daemons mercenaries, discovered that a Marilith was in command and was expected to hold until a ritual was performed. They negotiated a bit, then returned to their own troops, sent a different embassy to the general of Bel, who claimed that he could not attack because he did not have orders to do so, which the PCs did not expect and put them in quite a situation. Then left, dodging spies, sending their own assassins to secure a retreat path and to spy, and went to the Zariel general who flew into a rage and promised to attack, they made battle plans together. Then the PCs went back to their armies to organise, and now plan to go and perform the ritual, although they have been warned that they will be betrayed by some of their own generals who are only interested in the ritual anway...

And there is still so much that they have no idea of, what the ritual does, how it's linked to a number of artifacts, how some entities are planning to bring Graz'zt back as an archdevil, etc.

And it's the same in our Odyssey of the Dragonlords campaign, we spent several sessions in a city, interacting with NPCs, plotting to release some minotaurs, doing some propaganda for our cause, raiding a house to save minotaurs, then a long session for the trial of the culprit, etc. Mostly around NPCs and there was a map of the villa that we raided, where we had three short fights in about 2 hours, ecah fight being over in about 20 minutes.

It's all plots and intrigue and NPCs, not rooms and statues and DCs and attacks and powers. We do use a lot of spells and powers for the intrigue, though, I'm a half-siren demigoddess, so I never speak, I only chant, and I can charm crowds and win herald and trumpets trials at the local olympics.

What is her intrigue? To become divine ruler of the world. How is she achieving it? By taking over the domains of defeated gods. How do I depict this? Well, in play the PCs helped her take over the domain of winter-in-the-Feywild, by subduing the Frost Giants of the Feywild and obtaining their allegiance, and then defeating the Prince of Frost.

And what is the part of the PCs in this intrigue? Pawns going to fight, almost all the session was a fight. No intrigue, no plotting, just a bit of deception to slip in through a portal on a mission from their patron. After that it's all purely technical fight, with the conclusion being "The question now is, can they make it from 28th to 30th without an extended rest?". What a plot !

You don't fully state the techniques that you are using as a GM, but as best I can tell you are using fairly standard techniques that I would associate with Plansescape (say, a module like Dead Gods) or with some CoC scenarios: lots of backstory pre-authored by the GM; lots of adjudication of outcomes of declared actions (including, but not only, investigation-type actions) by reference to as-yet-unrevealed backstory; etc.

No, what I'm using most is the "set a situation and let the PC talk and gather good ideas from them in addition to my own so that I can steer the story in the direction that will make these ideas shine and the players pleased". It is very sneaky and underhanded, and I do some prep, but I'm always happy to retcon it to take into account a good idea from one of the players, sometimes positively (it's actually true !") sometimes negatively ("this is never going to happen"). I know, I'm a terrible DM, right ?

But this allows me to play all the evil suprageniuses that the PCs confront as really that way, as if they could sometimes second guess what the PCs would be doing. Certainly not all the time, not when it would frustrate them, just when it would make sense and be fun.

I don't think anyone in this thread has said they are bad or evil.

You mean, apart from using every single negative epithet that you can about them ? And slamming your door on the way out when a DM uses them ?

As a RPGer, I find the creation of shared fiction by applying and adjudicating the action resolution rules to colourful and engaging situations to be more rewarding than pre-authoring backstory and having the players declare actions that gradually prompt the GM to reveal that backstory. I'm glad that you think listening to your players makes you a virtuous GM; I also think it's good practice, but would go further and say that I regard it as pretty much the baseline. As you can see from the various examples of play I have offered, there is little or no fiction in my games that is not either framing, having regard to what the players have had their PCs do or want them to do, or else the narration of consequences following from their action declarations for their PCs.

If it's your perception, that's probably right (at least for you), but honestly it's not what I can gather from the summaries, see above....

But there are times when I have abandoned games because of poor GMing. I am not under any moral duty to spend my time in a hobby activity I am not enjoying in order to avoid mild hurt to the feelings of a relative stranger.

As a fellow gamer and actually as a reasonably empathic human being, I just think that you should avoid mild hurt even to total strangers, and even more to someone who just ran a game for you.

 

[Ovinomancer]

Doesn't work for me, I try to live by "show, don't tell". Telling everyone that some NPC is an evil genius only to have him behave like an idiot and be continuously outsmarted does not make for good verisimilitude.

Amusingly, I do as well. What you should try to do here is to reconcile that I can establish fiction without just resorting to exposition dumps. Where you get to that anything I said requires anyone to act like an idiot I don't know. I mean, I can assume that however you do it results in complete idiots and bad versimilitude, too, but why would I expect that another person intentionally seeks such things or plays in ways that encourage it? It seems that you've done yourself a disservice, in that you've shown everyone that you are not willing to actually conceive how something new to you might work, but instead can only imagine degenerate and bad outcomes for any approach that is not yours. Maybe treat yourself better?

Although, this is rather explained by your other posts, where you reveal that you're trying to defend your position against what you think are attacks trying to call it bad. None of that has been happening from the posters you've been engaged with over the last many pages (although I do think some, maybe @overgeeked, are very keen on calling any approach using any Force bad). I've been clear it's not. I'm answering your attacks that the things you want to do can only be accomplished in the one way you do them and all other ways don't work -- an ironic reversal of what you seem to fear. There are other ways, and they are different, and that's fine -- they aren't better or worse in any objective sense, only when compared to what a table wants, and that's up to the table. I will say that your absolute defiance of any other methods -- showcased across many threads -- as viable is probably to your detriment. I found that my play improved quite a bit when I really embraced other approaches and could therefore balance and appraise which and what works best for what I want.

This is a very technical answer, really not what I'm looking for, it's not my type of game.

The answer that I'm looking for is not in terms of mechanics but in terms of story and plot.

Okay, but I think you're completely tossing out the way that mechanics can create story and plot. The one I presented can be used to improv a super-genius villain that will reliably showcase the kinds of dastardly cunning you'd expect. It might not be how you want to do it, and that's fine, but saying that my answer doesn't provide results in terms of story and plot just shows that you aren't grasping how it is used and what it does in play. And that's fine, you don't have to; it would be nice if you were less hostile about it all.

Fun is obviously relative to your audience. What I'm telling you here, is that I'm looking for the maximum fun of my players, who are don't find technicalities fun or actually what they are looking for in a roleplaying game (again, in line with the 5e general design).

And what I'm saying is that there's always at least another choice you could have made that results in the same (or more) fun. It's not a metric that results in one right answer -- never does. Talking about fun is like saying that what you do results in all the players breathing at the table. Okay, great, they breathe/have fun. Mine do as well, with different choices. Fun is not a useful metric at all.

 

[pemerton]

People have answered, you're just not listening. You can easily do this by establishing the fiction that this guy is a super-genius clearly. This already strongly constrains the action-declaration space because the established fiction means that this guy doesn't fall for easy gambits. And you've established that this guy is playing hard and well, so you've foreshadowed the danger. Then you can make very hard moves on the players for any failures they make with this established. I don't have to prep anything, or lie, or deceive, just reveal new fiction when called for that's aligned with the resolution process and the established ficiton.

How this works specifically is going to depend on the game. In 5e, for instance, I could very easily just say that Super-Genius-Guy has an ability called "superior intellect" that imposes disadvantage on all checks that try to manipulate, deceive, or coerce SGG. Then, when actions are attempted that engage this trait, and fail, I deploy painful consequences to represent exactly how, in this case, SGG planned for exactly this contingency. On a success, the players actually get on over. This lets the players engage the fiction directly, in a thematic way, without me having to craft a web of Force and Illusionism or actually pre-guess their moves, and let's players stack resources for important actions, which is thematically appropriate. What they don't have to do is solve my prepared puzzle.

In other games, this is even easier because there's already mechanical structures in place for this.

Doesn't work for me, I try to live by "show, don't tell". Telling everyone that some NPC is an evil genius only to have him behave like an idiot and be continuously outsmarted does not make for good verisimilitude.

I don't see how this reply bears upon Ovinomancer's post.

Nowhere in Ovinomancer's post did he say, or imply, the way I portray a an evil genius is to have them behave like an idiot and be continuously outsmarted while asserting that they are an evil genius.

What he actually said was that you clearly establish the fiction that this antagonist is a super-genius. There are many ways to do this. Ovinomancer points to some that don't rely upon pre-authorship of backstory: foreshadowing (ie using "soft" moves to set up "harder" moves), and then following through on that, in framing and in narrating consequences.

This is a very technical answer, really not what I'm looking for, it's not my type of game.

The answer that I'm looking for is not in terms of mechanics but in terms of story and plot.

Ovinomancer's answer speaks directly to "story" and "plot". He is saying that (i) there are some games where what happens next is determined, in some fashion and to some significant degree, by application of the resolution mechanics, and (ii) that there are ways to do that which will establish, as fiction, that an antagonist is an evil genius.

For instance, suppose - by way of some prior episode of play - it has been established that the evil genius wants to take over such-and-such a fortress. The players have their PCs head to the fortress to foil the antagonist. The check they make to resolve their PCs' arrival fails. (What this check is will of course depend on system details. In Dungeon World it might be Undertaking a Perilous Journey. In 4e it might be a check made as part of a skill challenge. In Prince Valiant it might be a Riding check. In Burning Wheel it might be Orienteering augmented by Riding. Etc.) The GM can then narrate the consequence of failure: the antagonist is already there, having got to the fortress earlier than anticipated because of <insert evil scheming here> and was able to take it without much fighting because of <insert devious intrigue here>.

In the 5e D&D case, as Ovinomancer has said, you could even include the ability he mentioned such that whenever a player makes a check which directly pits their PC's wits against those of the antagonist, disadvantage applies. This will - on average, over time - either (i) increase the number of failures, and thus the opportunities to introduce the foreshadowing and the consequences that establish the antagonist as an evil genius, and/or (ii) increase the amount of resources the player spend to have their PCs succeed in these contests of wits (eg spells or other class abilities used to enhance these checks), thus driving home how hard it is for the PCs to wrestle with the antagonist.

This is the stuff that "story" and "plot" are made of!

 

[Campbell]

There is just a fundamental disconnect between the way we see the GM role.

I do not run games for people. I play games with people where I happen to take on the GM role. Sometimes I am the GM. Sometimes I am not. No special priveleges or consideration are due to the person behind the screen. Anyone who is brand new to anything deserves some leeway, but not because they are sitting in the right chair.

When I sit in the GM chair I am not special nor am I making some sacrifice play. I am not jumping on a grenade. Honestly if you view the GM role that way I don't want to play any roleplaying games with you regardless of style or where you sit. I'm looking for active, enthusiastic collaborators. If you are a player and I am the GM I am going need you to bring it, keep me accountable, and accept accountability. If we're both players I am going to need you to bring it, keep me accountable, and accept accountability. If you are the GM I am going to need you to bring it, keep me accountable, and accept accountability. If you are not there yet I can help, but that needs to be the goal.

That's strong language for what is a much convivial and relaxed process in real life, but I just do not have the will to deal with attendant complex of guilt trips, mismatched power dynamics, and confused social dynamics that go with the idea that someone is sacrificing for other people's enjoyment in what should be a fun leisure experience. I am certainly not intending to sacrifice myself on the altar of other people's fun when I'm taking on the GM role. We should all be having fun together, not thinking about how other people owe us.

I'm not saying don't be patient and understanding with new GMs. Absolutely be patient and understanding with them. Also be patient and understanding with new players. Have empathy for everyone. Also keep everyone accountable for the shared experience. Don't put that pressure all on one person.

 

[Ovinomancer]

I don't see how this reply bears upon Ovinomancer's post.

Nowhere in Ovinomancer's post did he say, or imply, the way I portray a an evil genius is to have them behave like an idiot and be continuously outsmarted while asserting that they are an evil genius.

What he actually said was that you clearly establish the fiction that this antagonist is a super-genius. There are many ways to do this. Ovinomancer points to some that don't rely upon pre-authorship of backstory: foreshadowing (ie using "soft" moves to set up "harder" moves), and then following through on that, in framing and in narrating consequences.


Ovinomancer's answer speaks directly to "story" and "plot". He is saying that (i) there are some games where what happens next is determined, in some fashion and to some significant degree, by application of the resolution mechanics, and (ii) that there are ways to do that which will establish, as fiction, that an antagonist is an evil genius.

For instance, suppose - by way of some prior episode of play - it has been established that the evil genius wants to take over such-and-such a fortress. The players have their PCs head to the fortress to foil the antagonist. The check they make to resolve their PCs' arrival fails. (What this check is will of course depend on system details. In Dungeon World it might be Undertaking a Perilous Journey. In 4e it might be a check made as part of a skill challenge. In Prince Valiant it might be a Riding check. In Burning Wheel it might be Orienteering augmented by Riding. Etc.) The GM can then narrate the consequence of failure: the antagonist is already there, having got to the fortress earlier than anticipated because of <insert evil scheming here> and was able to take it without much fighting because of <insert devious intrigue here>.

In the 5e D&D case, as Ovinomancer has said, you could even include the ability he mentioned such that whenever a player makes a check which directly pits their PC's wits against those of the antagonist, disadvantage applies. This will - on average, over time - either (i) increase the number of failures, and thus the opportunities to introduce the foreshadowing and the consequences that establish the antagonist as an evil genius, and/or (ii) increase the amount of resources the player spend to have their PCs succeed in these contests of wits (eg spells or other class abilities used to enhance these checks), thus driving home how hard it is for the PCs to wrestle with the antagonist.

This is the stuff that "story" and "plot" are made of!

There isn't a like button for "Exactly so" hence this reply -- exactly so.

 

[pemerton]

As a fellow gamer and actually as a reasonably empathic human being, I just think that you should avoid mild hurt even to total strangers, and even more to someone who just ran a game for you.

@Campbell gave a full response to this.

Here are some other things to add to it: running a game for me isn't doing a favour, any more than me letting the GM run his game was doing him a favour. In the case of the railroading kobold GM, the other players and I invited him to join the game that we set up in lieu of his, and he declined. So clearly he didn't think that GMing a game was some sort of onerous act of generosity that he would like to avoid if possible!

You argument seems to be that every RPGer is obliged to play in every game they possibly can, regardless of how good or bad it is, and how much the do or don't enjoy it. Because if that's not your argument, then you are saying that sometimes it's OK to withdraw from a game. And once you say that, you have no basis to criticise me, or @Hussar, or anyone else for having done so.