D&D General Railroads, Illusionism, and Participationism

[Ovinomancer]

And it's really interesting how much you need to strawman me to try and attack me. It's pretty pathetic, actually.

The only thing I've said is that, over the editions, there have clearly been varying design goals with the various editions, and that are therefore inherently more or less suited to certain play styles. What's the point of having a very formal and constrained game if you only want to tell a story ? However, if you want to play CaS, an edition with inherent balance and control of the options is inherently much better. After that, there might be other factors for preferring an edition, and I, for one, have always found a way to play the games I wanted whatever the edition, it's just that I found it more awkward with some, considering my type of game. But please feel free coming up with actual arguments instead of attacks like this.

There's no strawman here. You're insisting on selective reading of 4e and your own interpretation and dismissing statements made by the designers because they're not in the book and disagree with your point (you seem just fine with designer statements outside of rulebooks that agree with you). And you talked about how you played B/X earlier in the thread where you were describing play that doesn't at all sound like what was in the book (you talked of cool stories and cool characters being badass while the B/X ruleset only covers some pretty hardcore dungeoncrawling). So, no, no strawmen here. You are extremely permissive of 5e (and, apparently, older editions) but insist that 4e can only be evaluated according to the way you read the rules and only with the things you'll allow (strangely, everything that would disagree with you is disallowed). It's a solid double standard.

I didn't play 4e anything like story now. I was running it solidly like I ran 3.x, with only the required adjustments (different rules, natch). I played it very trad, prepped sandbox style, and certainly nowhere close to story now. I didn't pick up story now as even a viable concept until well after 5e was out. And, given that, the game you're describing is utterly alien to me. The rulebooks explicitly stated, even in the first DMG, that powers can be used in skill challenges and may even be worth multiple successes (p74, Step 4: Other Considerations).

In short, the game you're trying to be authoritative on you just come across as someone that has an idea about it but no real understanding of it. Which is fine, except for the authoritative bit, and that just makes it look foolish.

 

[Lyxen]

There's no strawman here. You're insisting on selective reading of 4e

This is really funny, actually. I am the one doing selective reading when actually some people here don't even read the rules or straight up say that the designers were wrong to read them ?

and your own interpretation and dismissing statements made by the designers because they're not in the book and disagree with your point (you seem just fine with designer statements outside of rulebooks that agree with you).

Please bring me designer's intent, then, because I don't think I've seen any from you. After that, yes, 4e is restrictive. Please explain to me why you can't fly, just hop around the battlefield ? So when combining the statements with the actual rules, it fairly obvious why the game was designed a certain way, for example: "A competitive sport has referees. It needs them. Someone impartial involved in the game needs to make sure everyone’s playing by the rules. The role of the Dungeon Master has a little in common with that of a referee."

So please, by all means, bring me differing designer's intent, from any source, that contradicts my view.

And you talked about how you played B/X earlier in the thread where you were describing play that doesn't at all sound like what was in the book (you talked of cool stories and cool characters being badass while the B/X ruleset only covers some pretty hardcore dungeoncrawling).

And yet this proves that you have not read it properly (which is ironic considering the above), since it already says things like: "The D&D game has neither losers nor winners, it has only gamers who relish exercising their imagination. The players and the DM share in creating adventures in fantastic lands where heroes abound and magic really works. In a sense, the D&D game has no rules, only rule suggestions. No rule is inviolate, particularly if a new or altered rule will encourage creativity and imagination. The important thing is to enjoy the adventure."

Nothing in there says "dungeon crawling", and actually the X is about wilderness anyway. But what matters is that it's an open system, compared to 4e, which describes the role of the DM first and foremost with : "A competitive sport has referees. It needs them. Someone impartial involved in the game needs to make sure everyone’s playing by the rules.", which then makes it not a surprise that it's described as "An alternative would be for the rules to severely limit what characters can do, which would be counter to the open-endedness of D&D."

So, no, no strawmen here. You are extremely permissive of 5e (and, apparently, older editions) but insist that 4e can only be evaluated according to the way you read the rules and only with the things you'll allow (strangely, everything that would disagree with you is disallowed). It's a solid double standard.

I'm sorry, but when a game describes itself as rigid, and implement rigid rules with little squares and constrains what you can do to specific things, it's not hard to see that it's rigid. When a game tells you all about rules, insist that it's the DM's primary function, and even how to write up a house rules, it's not hard to compare it to a game which tells you "No rule is inviolate" or "A Dungeon Master adjudicates the game and determines whether to use an official ruling in play. The DM always has the final say on rules questions." or "rulings over rules".

I didn't play 4e anything like story now. I was running it solidly like I ran 3.x, with only the required adjustments (different rules, natch). I played it very trad, prepped sandbox style, and certainly nowhere close to story now. I didn't pick up story now as even a viable concept until well after 5e was out. And, given that, the game you're describing is utterly alien to me. The rulebooks explicitly stated, even in the first DMG, that powers can be used in skill challenges and may even be worth multiple successes (p74, Step 4: Other Considerations).

"These might allow special uses of skills, perhaps with a bonus.", yeah right, how nice, how open...

In short, the game you're trying to be authoritative on you just come across as someone that has an idea about it but no real understanding of it. Which is fine, except for the authoritative bit, and that just makes it look foolish.

I don't feel foolish, I wonder how you are doing arguing and attacking like a madman without one ounce of supporting evidence ?

 

[Umbran]

Mod Note:
Hey, @Lyxen and @Ovinomancer - you two are making the discussion personal. It is time for you two to stop responding to each other.

 

[bert1001 fka bert1000]

I liked your post but am not sure I agree about "narrowness" - it's true the GM has less creative/authorial freedom, but the flipside can be that the players have more, because not hostage to the GM's unconstrained opinion as to when the fiction crystallises into failure or victory.

I agree with you -- for my table and many others that were willing to use skill challenges this way it did create tremendous player freedom and opened up creativity. There is a lot of freedom to knowing that an "in scope" action will result in a pre-defined difficulty (+/- leveled DC) and a pre-defined impact (1 success worth).

The "narrowness" was a reference to the impact side. You can't usually do 1 action/check/power/ritual that leads to complete success in the goal, however 'appropriate' the action. This never bothered me, as the resolution structure was by design set up to create longer, more complicated challenges that by design could not be defeated by 1 check/action. The fiction could support adding complications in many consistent ways with previous fiction so it was never a problem.

 

[Helpful NPC Thom]

@Lyxen, again, you are misunderstanding what I'm saying. I have repeatedly and unequivocally stated that I am not interested in playing D&D without theatrical roleplaying elements and a reduced emphasis on tactical miniatures gameplay.

Allow me to restate another time, clearly, and with bold emphasis:

Skillful D&D play leverages the system's mechanics (character building, resource expenditure, and combat prowess) to achieve desirable outcomes (typically combat victory).

And:

I am not interested in skillful D&D play.

When playing D&D, I aim to play as minimally skillful as possible. Can my character pull his own weight? Can he contribute approximately as well as the other characters? That is where I aim. I don't play with groups that utilize overly-skillful play because it is, like, totally lame, maaaaan.

Regarding wins and losses within D&D:

The win/loss state of D&D does not requires explicit call-out in the text because it is implicit: the reduction of a character to zero hit points and three failed death saves results in character death, which is an effective "game over" for the player character. Outside of mechanics that undo this loss condition (resurrection), the state of character death is permanent and irreversible, and the player must now create a new character.

No, there's not a piece of rules text that says "if this happens, the game stops, and the player characters win (or lose)," because D&D's structure lacks the constraints of other games (a design element that we might consider incoherent, per Ron Edwards terminology). Likewise, D&D lacks direct textual support that it is a team game, but the formulation of XP budgets, adventure modules, and Challenge Ratings all evidence that the player characters will be working together to overcome challenges. There's no rules saying that the isn't played with the player characters commanding little armies of monsters to battle one another, but that's obviously not how the game is played, and it would be dishonest to imply otherwise...in the same way that it is dishonest to imply that character death isn't a loss state.

The authors claim you can't "lose" D&D except in the case in which a session fails to generate sufficient fun. (How many kilowatts of fun is required to produce a win condition, I wonder.) Their own rules award XP for defeating monsters in combat. This alone indicates a lesser win/loss condition: a win is defeating a monster and the reward is gaining experience, a loss is not defeating a monster and not gaining experience. Poker has lesser win/loss conditions: a win is having the high card and taking the pot, a loss is having a lower card and losing the wager. You may not lose the entire game from a single hand, but there it is.

 

[Ovinomancer]

@Lyxen, again, you are misunderstanding what I'm saying. I have repeatedly and unequivocally stated that I am not interested in playing D&D without theatrical roleplaying elements and a reduced emphasis on tactical miniatures gameplay.

Allow me to restate another time, clearly, and with bold emphasis:

Skillful D&D play leverages the system's mechanics (character building, resource expenditure, and combat prowess) to achieve desirable outcomes (typically combat victory).

And:

I am not interested in skillful D&D play.

When playing D&D, I aim to play as minimally skillful as possible. Can my character pull his own weight? Can he contribute approximately as well as the other characters? That is where I aim. I don't play with groups that utilize overly-skillful play because it is, like, totally lame, maaaaan.

Regarding wins and losses within D&D:

The win/loss state of D&D does not requires explicit call-out in the text because it is implicit: the reduction of a character to zero hit points and three failed death saves results in character death, which is an effective "game over" for the player character. Outside of mechanics that undo this loss condition (resurrection), the state of character death is permanent and irreversible, and the player must now create a new character.

No, there's not a piece of rules text that says "if this happens, the game stops, and the player characters win (or lose)," because D&D's structure lacks the constraints of other games (a design element that we might consider incoherent, per Ron Edwards terminology). Likewise, D&D lacks direct textual support that it is a team game, but the formulation of XP budgets, adventure modules, and Challenge Ratings all evidence that the player characters will be working together to overcome challenges. There's no rules saying that the isn't played with the player characters commanding little armies of monsters to battle one another, but that's obviously not how the game is played, and it would be dishonest to imply otherwise...in the same way that it is dishonest to imply that character death isn't a loss state.

The authors claim you can't "lose" D&D except in the case in which a session fails to generate sufficient fun. (How many kilowatts of fun is required to produce a win condition, I wonder.) Their own rules award XP for defeating monsters in combat. This alone indicates a lesser win/loss condition: a win is defeating a monster and the reward is gaining experience, a loss is not defeating a monster and not gaining experience. Poker has lesser win/loss conditions: a win is having the high card and taking the pot, a loss is having a lower card and losing the wager. You may not lose the entire game from a single hand, but there it is.

This, again, appears to place a caricature of skilled play out in order to beat the stuffing out of it. It suggests it's just char-op and good tactics. That's not the entirety, and none of the examples I provided of skilled play even touch on char-op or even tactical play in combat. My Blades example stays very far away from that. Sure, char-op and tactical combat play can be part of skilled play, but using as if that's the sum of it is like suggesting that RPGs are just games that use funny dice.

Skilled play is more that just using the mechanics -- most play uses the mechanics! Skilled play is about leveraging the fiction, PC resources, and using the system to achieve play goals. If my goals are just to crush in combat, then skilled play is what you say above. This isn't at all the only goal that can result, and skilled play is about not hoping those goals come to you, but using what you have to make them happen. It's really the difference between strongly engaging the fiction and the system with a purpose and just being entertained by the game.

 

[Helpful NPC Thom]

This, again, appears to place a caricature of skilled play out in order to beat the stuffing out of it. It suggests it's just char-op and good tactics. That's not the entirety, and none of the examples I provided of skilled play even touch on char-op or even tactical play in combat. My Blades example stays very far away from that. Sure, char-op and tactical combat play can be part of skilled play, but using as if that's the sum of it is like suggesting that RPGs are just games that use funny dice.

Skilled play is more that just using the mechanics -- most play uses the mechanics! Skilled play is about leveraging the fiction, PC resources, and using the system to achieve play goals. If my goals are just to crush in combat, then skilled play is what you say above. This isn't at all the only goal that can result, and skilled play is about not hoping those goals come to you, but using what you have to make them happen. It's really the difference between strongly engaging the fiction and the system with a purpose and just being entertained by the game.

Skillful play is not the the same as skillful D&D 5e play.

My argument is that skillful D&D play relies specifically on character optimization and tactics because those are the primary rules in D&D 5e. Without any mechanical backing to other parts of the game--mostly defaulting to GM fiat--there's no objective way to skillfully play D&D in the same way that one can skillfully play other games. Blades utilizes the fiction to influence position and effect, Mouseguard utilizes traits to gain checks, Fate utilizes compels to gain Fate points. D&D doesn't have those, so the bits and pieces we can discuss without resorting to anecdotes is limited.

 

[Ovinomancer]

Skillful play is not the the same as skillful D&D 5e play.

My argument is that skillful D&D play relies specifically on character optimization and tactics because those are the primary rules in D&D 5e. Without any mechanical backing to other parts of the game--mostly defaulting to GM fiat--there's no objective way to skillfully play D&D in the same way that one can skillfully play other games. Blades utilizes the fiction to influence position and effect, Mouseguard utilizes traits to gain checks, Fate utilizes compels to gain Fate points. D&D doesn't have those, so the bits and pieces we can discuss without resorting to anecdotes is limited.

So, the two examples of 5e play I posted that weren't about char-op and tactics were not skilled play? I'd like to be clear.

If we're arguing that 5e is immune to skilled play because GM fiat is the force majeure in 5e, then that claim is that 5e play is GM-may-I and you're going to get quite a lot of pushback there. And, even in that case, skilled play would be about playing the GM.

 

[Helpful NPC Thom]

So, the two examples of 5e play I posted that weren't about char-op and tactics were not skilled play? I'd like to be clear.

If we're arguing that 5e is immune to skilled play because GM fiat is the force majeure in 5e, then that claim is that 5e play is GM-may-I and you're going to get quite a lot of pushback there. And, even in that case, skilled play would be about playing the GM.

I could be persuaded to amend my statements that skillful 5e play does involve playing the GM, but there is no way to discuss that objectively since what one GM views as reasonable another GM views as unreasonable. Two identical inputs, two divergent outputs. Unlike with to-hit vs. Armor Class, where a roll of 11 vs. AC 10 will always results in a hit. The ability to play the GM is skillful (and "the fiction" factors heavily into this), but it is extraneous to system-related concerns...and there's no way to discuss them objectively.

 

[Maxperson]

The game's authors are wrong, period. I never said playing D&D to "have fun" is badwrongfun (you are repeatedly misinterpreting what I am stating), I said their claims that "winning" D&D is "having fun" is incorrect because there is a defined win/loss state in the rules.

What is that win/loss state? I can't recall having seen it.