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

[prabe]

Oh, for sure, and it's why I used "not supposed to" instead of "not allowed to". But it's definitely part of the culture, as it were, to keep that stuff minimal (I am reading the pretty nifty essay about cultures of play somebody linked above). "Play to find out" and all that.

Sure, but if you're making something up from whole cloth, maybe you feel as though you need something more prepped, which you can then improvise on top of; or maybe you just aren't any good at completely ad-libbing [whatever] so you write some stuff down to use if/when it comes up.

I don't see either of those as entirely incompatible with Story Now--it's really on the GM to stick to the principles (but, really, it always is).

 

[loverdrive]

Not arguing, but it seems there might be some overlap between "add fuel to the story" and "fair and logical response."

To some extent, there's an overlap between all three. Getting the story back on track also, preferably, looks fair and makes sense within the game world.

It's the matter of priority, I'd say. When a character walk into a mutant hideout without checking for boobytraps for one reason or another, it's fair and logical for them to be blown up to pieces with a tripwire-activated bomb. It makes sense that whoever laid this trap wouldn't be so generous to give the intruder chance to escape before the explosion, right? But it's kind of bad for the story: hardboiled action heroes don't die in such fashion, so in story now game like AW, a proper response would be something along the lines of "You walk in... SNAP of a tripwire, CLICK of a safety pin removed, CLANK of a grenade falling to the floor. What ya gonna do?".

Many things that can happen to a nameless mook or a bottom-tier NPC just can't happen to a protagonist or an NPC they care about. A random drunkard can walk out of their watering hole and find a bullet lodged between his eyes, but if it was a PC, the bullet would fly half an inch above her head with a scary supersonic boom -- and that's quite unfair, if you ask me.

 

[prabe]

To some extent, there's an overlap between all three. Getting the story back on track also, preferably, looks fair and makes sense within the game world.

Maybe also "feels fair at the table?" I mean, as the priority for "fair," here. I figure different tables will probably have different opinions on, for instance, whether it's fair or not for NPCs to die more easily than PCs. Also, plausibly, depends on the expectations the game rules set (to use your grenade trap example, D&D kinda sets the expectation there will be a save, which ... might not really be logical).

 

[Lanefan]

Here is the opening scene of Lost Caverns of Tsjocanth:

START​

For the Dungeon Master: Read the BACKGROUND and Players’ Start to your players. Allow them to copy down the verse clue to the location of the cavern, if they ask. Explain to them that they are now on a narrow pathway that wends ever deep into the mountains. The sun is just emerging over the peaks to the east; it is time for them to set forth. . . .​

​

For the Players: Your party has been gathered by agents of the Margrave of the March of Bissel. He tells you that there are “political considerations,” which he does not explain, that prevent him from searching for Iggwilv’s trove himself. However, it is vital that the treasure not fall into the hands of his enemies. Your party’s goal is to get the treasure before Bissel’s enemies do. [What follows is a discussion of the support provided by the Margrave to the PCs, and their obligations to him in respect of repayment.]​

​

An examination of your map reveals that the track through the mountains has numerous branches. At the end of each track is a number, evidently standing for something unknown. The agents of the Margrave cannot tell you anything about their significance, except that it is likely that at one of the sites are the caverns you seek. Obviously, the map is incomplete, for from what you know of this part of the world, there are mountains where nothing but blank space is shown on the chart. With this map you must somehow find where the treasure is hidden. The more direct your route to the caverns, the less the likelihood of injury or death from the many perils of the journey. A scrap of parchment with a bit of doggerel on it might be a clue, or it might be of no use whatsoever, save to mislead you.​

​

[What follows is the verse.]​

​

After a journey of a sen’night your band has reached the foothills of the Yatils without incident. Before you is the winding path leading into the grim mountains.​

This is not a compelling scene. It's a location on a map.

And it's written mostly, I think, to suit situations where a DM is running the module as a one-off, or as part of some sort of tournament; in the not-unreasonable assumption that any DM inserting this module into an ongoing campaign is going to either chuck that backstory and replace it with something campaign-specific or is going to introduce scenes etc. earlier in the campaign such that the above background fits in (ideally, seamlessly) when it appears.

Just because it's written there doesn't mean a DM has to use it.

 

[Campbell]

When I run more traditional games like Pathfinder Second Edition, Worlds Without Number, RuneQuest, Vampire - The Requiem, Exalted Third Edition or Legend of the Five Rings I do so in a way that is pretty similar to Ron Edwards' accounts of his own Champions and RuneQuest games. Basically I work with the other players during character creation to build a constellation of NPCs around them and build a setting around them. Then while the game is ongoing my prep (NPC and scenario design) is guided by player character dramatic needs, but in the course of the game session I am just trying to play the world and especially the NPCs with integrity. When I improvise over the course of a session it's always guided by what feels most true. The scenes I frame are entirely guided by trying to represent the scenario as honestly as possible. I do this because I want the play space to feel as tangible as possible for all the players (including the GM). I call this Story Now in the Streets, Right to Dream in the Sheets.

This sort of play experience is worlds apart from my experience running games like Marvel Heroic, Blades in the Dark and Apocalypse World. The GM I must enjoy playing in traditional games with also runs Infinity and Vampire in pretty much the same way. His Tremulus, Apocalypse World, and Marvel Heroic games feel nothing like Infinity or Vampire.

As an aside the prep work I do for this sort of play is pretty massive, but mostly because I enjoy doing the prep work. Once I get the bug I find I have trouble not prepping.

 

[Ovinomancer]

I agree that "Backstory first", as @pemerton is defining the category, appears to distinguish Story Now from other approaches. Indeed as a category it seems purposefully defined to do exactly that. I asked pemerton what purpose they saw in categorizing together disperate approaches because I want to know if they see any additional purpose to the "Backstory first" category beyond just distinguishing Story Now.

If the main use of the "Backstory first" category is to distinguish the approach it was defined to distinguish, that makes it a perfect example of axiomatic categorization.

(Which, to be clear, would not by itself mean there's anything wrong with "Backstory first" as a category. But it would explain disinterest in using the category by those who prefer to categorize playstyles in a way that more closely tracks differences in play experiences.)

This is mistaken. You're noting that if your intent is to separate two things with an arbitrary categorization you will end up with a division of two things. The analysis being presented in this thread shows, along the rubric of backstory, two large distinctions (three actually). You then think that since there are such distinctions, and that you can get there via arbitrary definition, that this must be what's happened. You're neglecting the clear evidence that the analysis is actually of play.

Everyone putting this forward plays multiple different games and many have extensive experience with D&D. This isn't people that play these games and not those games saying how they must work -- that's actually coming from one segment of commenters here and not the ones advocating for this analysis but those arguing against it. Instead, we're all more than willing to put out play in front of you, talk about exactly what's happening where, and exactly how we approach different games from the different approaches. When I learned to play D&D, I didn't know anything else, so how I learned to play is utterly untouched by any future theory or thinking. Yet, I can 100% identify how I played (and in some ways still play) D&D today with others that don't have any experience with other games. It is not that I am defining (or @pemerton, or @hawkeyefan, or @Campbell, or @Manbearcat, or others) play just to arbitrarily separate games. This is entirely about experience and application. And I do both sides.

In other words, this isn't a categorization to say this goes in bin a and this in bin b. There are games that are hard to categorize. It is, instead, actual analysis of how the games work. And it's not just me, or the people I listed, there are entire communities that discuss and play and design these games and what we're saying here what is being used in all of that.

You do not have to like these other games. You don't even have to try them. But, for God's sake, please stop intimating that they just don't work that way or that people discussing them are doing so in bad faith just label games as Good and Bad. You can't find a single person doing that. The only thing you will find are people that say they, personally, prefer some to others.

 

[niklinna]

Sure, but if you're making something up from whole cloth, maybe you feel as though you need something more prepped, which you can then improvise on top of; or maybe you just aren't any good at completely ad-libbing [whatever] so you write some stuff down to use if/when it comes up.

I don't see either of those as entirely incompatible with Story Now--it's really on the GM to stick to the principles (but, really, it always is).

We are not in disagreement.

 

[Ovinomancer]

Sure, but if you're making something up from whole cloth, maybe you feel as though you need something more prepped, which you can then improvise on top of; or maybe you just aren't any good at completely ad-libbing [whatever] so you write some stuff down to use if/when it comes up.

I don't see either of those as entirely incompatible with Story Now--it's really on the GM to stick to the principles (but, really, it always is).

Yes, and no. You can prep things like this -- ideas you might use and have against need. But you can't deploy them unless the game calls for them. So, if I have an idea that Bobbo the Clown is the murderer, I should toss this idea straight out -- it's unlikely to be relevant. If I have an idea for a murderous clown that haunts dark alleys, I can put that on the back burner and maybe, in a score where a failed roll might in a situation might very well lend itself to me narrating a creepy clown laugh coming from the darkness at the end. Bobbo the Haunted Clown makes an appearance! But only if I need a quasi-supernatural, super creepy threat to pay off the promise of position and effect on a failed roll.

Here's how I would prep for a score to the Deathlands -- I'd read up on the (scant) description in the rulebook, imagine a couple of creepy deathland horrors, and maybe a few ideas for haunted ruins, and maybe even write one or two things down. Then, I'd not ever look at any of it when I ran the game. Why bother? Because it sets a mood, a set of thoughts, and helps me evoke more clearly since I've spent a bit of time in that groove.

I once presented a zombie in a Blades game -- an alchemical recipe gone wrong. The wasn't anything special, just needed a threat and the crew were investigating missing alchemists. But, then the Hound shot at it, from about 10 paces away, and rolled all 1's. A clean failure! However, you do not ever narrate incompetence as part of a failure in Blades -- the PCs are assumed competent! How on the broken earth could the Hound have missed? Ah, turns out that the zombie wasn't just a zombie -- in that very moment we all discovered that it could stutter-step through the ghost-field, and instead of being ten paces away, it just stuttered through the intervening space like a flickering jump-cut in an old Super 8 reel, and that's how the Hound missed. And now had a zombie in their face -- a super creepy teleporting zombie!

That's how improve in Blades works -- you stick to the genre and principles of play and you find out what happens right alongside the players. That zombie was a running bad guy -- got their own clocks even -- for a number of sessions after. I framed it as a run of the mill threat to start, because "zombie" sounded suitably okay for alchemy gone wrong.

 

[niklinna]

That article on Six Cultures of Gaming is leading me to some interesting stuff; thanks @Neonchameleon! One in particular may be of further interest to folks here – Observations on GNS Simulationism, with this juicy bit on railroading:

GM Story Hour

Or, “railroading” as it’s more commonly called – I prefer to use a different term to reduce preconceptions and draw attention to what’s pertinent for our purposes. (“Railroading” was conceived as a deconstructive critique of this practice; it’s the name an enemy grants to the phenomenon.)

“GM story hour” is a roleplaying game activity where one of the players – the titular GM – prepares a structured agenda platter for the session of play, and the play activity itself then concerns processing through this pre-prepared content. The content is usually structured analogously to a linear narrative, so there’s “scene 1”, “scene 2”, etc. that are processed through play in the order pre-determined by the GM. The story hour is defined by the content authority of prepared material, delivered in fixed order.
I’ve developed some modest story hour theory myself; to put it briefly, I believe that railroading play, despite how common it is, is generally misunderstood to concern itself mostly with the causal “A leads to B” path procession through the GM’s prepared material. This type of railroading theory leads to complex conceptualizations like hub models (alternate roads you allow the players to pick from) and magician’s choice (the players think they’re choosing, but really they’re not) and generally focusing your creative energies towards the dysfunction of trying to manage a GM story hour where the GM can’t tell the other players that it’s a story hour, and everybody else is trying their damnedest to jump the tracks. This kind of railroading theory is worthless because its central ambition is to make railroading do something it is not suited to – a pretense of the tracks not existing when they really, genuinely, practically do.

What I would like to offer as a modest alternative to old-fashioned railroading theory is that the purpose of the GM story hour is not to cheat and create an illusion of freedom; it is to exquisitely prepare nuanced literary material for intimate consideration. The strength of the railroading game structure is not in hiding the tracks, but rather in ensuring that those tracks travel through scenes worthy of spending some time in. You’re literally only bothering with the railroad tracks because you don’t want to waste time preparing complex content and then just have the other players skip it; it’s much better to take the track as a given and focus on how to make your content worth the trip.

I’ve written about this in more detail elsewhere, but the key consideration is treating your game prep the same way an adventure video game does: your core strength is being able to prepare carefully, and the freedoms you give to the player are carefully constrained to ensure that you actually get to show off your stuff. It is still interactive, as the player has the primary control over the pace (how quickly you go over your material) and focus (what parts of your material are particularly observed) of play, even as the GM by definition holds primary content authority. The GM decides what play will be about, but the other players decide how they investigate that aboutness.

The GM story hour is an appropriate game structure for games where a single player introduces specific subject matter to the other players. It is extremely important that the introduced matter is good stuff, creatively relevant to the participants. Tracy Hickman understood this in his magnum opus Dragonlance, pushing the AD&D content delivery chassis to its extreme ends and beyond in an effort to deliver a true high fantasy epic via a game structurally very poorly suited for the purpose; Hickman understood that if there was to be a measure of grace to the project, it would be in the fact that the GM would in his interminable story hour be delivering actually legit fantasy literature. (Not discussing the Dragonlance novels here, note, but the adventure modules.)

You never, ever want to be in a position to deliver a story hour with naughty word, trivial material. Respect yourself, respect your friends, and if you choose to play a game structured for the story hour, bring something you actually want to tell the other players about. Something that you can describe to them, and then let them ask questions, and then answer those questions gladly, confident that you’re engaging in an intelligent, meaningful activity. If you can’t convince yourself about your material being interesting, don’t expect others to care, either.

 

[prabe]

Yes, and no. You can prep things like this -- ideas you might use and have against need. But you can't deploy them unless the game calls for them.

Um. This was what I meant by it being up to the GM to stick to principles. While the thinking closest to the top was for a game like my own 5E campaigns--where the constraints are entirely self-imposed--I was also thinking or Blades or some PbtA-ish stuff, where the GM is more limited by-rule.

Dig the ideas of Bobbo the Homicidal Clown and the teleporting zombie.