D&D General Railroads, Illusionism, and Participationism

[FrozenNorth]

And the fact you seem to think I'm part of the D&D in-group (a game I've indicated any number of times that I have zero interest in) is a pretty good indicator why I think you're either being oblivious or disingenuous.

I can definitely confirm from other posts that Thomas is one of those dangerous radicals who enjoys PF2 (and probably some other games).

 

[prabe]

WotC definitely publishes more APs than short form adventures, but to me, we need to temper this conclusion with two others. 1- Compared to previous editions, publishing APs seems to be replacing short adventures, not homebrew campaigns. 2- WotC supports DMs Guild, as a replacement for the short form adventures it (mostly) no longer publishes.

I think you might have that a little wrong. I suspect the hardcover adventures are replacing at least as much in the way of homebrew campaigns as they are people running shorter adventures--especially since many of those shorter adventures were themselves parts of larger series. I think some DMs are finding the shorter adventures they want/need on DM's Guild.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

Okay, let's compare to something in 5e -- an attack declaration. The player declares an attempt to hit an orc with their sword. Is the player authoring into the fiction that the orc was struck by their sword if they get a success on the attack roll? Compare to Spout Lore.

It would be comparable if player declaring that they attack an orc would make the orc appear.

 

[Cadence]

Sure. Really it's about what work the system does and how different systems do different work. In 5e, it's no controversial at all that the orc is hit and that this bit of fiction is the system's say, suggested by the player and described by the GM. This is normal. When it's applied outside of normal, like outside of combat, it's weird because 5e doesn't have the system have a say here. But, in reality, the difference is not one of kind -- the player suggests an outcome, the system says who gets the say, and the GM describes the outcome accordingly. Constraints are different, but the function of the game, the actual play, is the same.

I'm pondering, and I think it feels weird to me to have a player rolling/declaring where a person IRL doesn't have impact on it. So a roll for determining how positive a social interaction seems ok to me because I'd like to think what a person does has an impact on social interactions. A roll to see if a character is able to solve an engineering problem seems ok to me because I'd like to think the effort and training a person has would have an impact on that. A roll to find a forge that exists seems ok to me because I'd like to think peoples effort and luck determine whether they can locate things.*

It feels different to me to have the DM (as an oracle checking procedure; perhaps using dice perhaps not) consult a (maybe not yet fully rendered) mental-map to see if a forge exists, than it does for me as the PC to have the forge come into existence because I want it to. I'm imagining a twilight zone episode where the world the main character hasn't seen yet doesn't exist until they go look. Say the main character is looking for a store of some sort - it feels like a very different episode to me if the show has the between-the-seconds craftsmen building out what's there according to some pre-made plan, vs. them listening in on the characters thoughts and altering the plans based on what the character in the show wants. Or it feels like a very different theological world view to have a world created where humanity can "succeed" if they all work together and do the right thing, vs. a world where the divine decides each day to nudge things against whatever rules of science others might see and miraculously reward/punish folks based on what they've done.

There is of course a tension there. I'd like for the world I'm exploring to have things interesting to my character in it - and not be too real life in terms of the random bad stuff that seems to happen in terms of drudgery and pain and set backs. And so I do want the DM to have built (or be rendering) the world based on those general desires.

So maybe a better example is a Star Trek:TNG episode where someone wants to go in the holodeck to experience what a well trained explorer might experience on some planet, specifically in regards to discovering ancient ruins. They call up that program and go have some recreation time. It feels like a very different holodeck program if the holodeck is generating parts of that planet full of interesting things at an appropriate difficulty level for the crew member to go check out and the crew member wondering if they'll see something in particular or not, as compared to a holodeck program that takes verbal cues from the crew member about what it should generate around the next virtual corner.

Or similarly, when one starts up Minecraft there are a lot of options and mods to set what is in the world before you start playing so that you're pretty sure you'll find interesting things. And then you can go off in survival mode and see what you can find. Or you can set it on creative mode and hit a button or type a command to have the game spawn whatever you want if it wasn't there. Survival mode seems very different from creative mode.

Is creative mode weird to the survival mode player just because it's not survival mode (because the creative mode things weren't in the survival mode rules)? Or is it because there's a difference in kind? Where would a "stochastic creative mode", where you can try to spawn things in parts of the screen you hadn't seen yet, but there's a chance of failure, fall?

Edit:
* Disclaimer: I'm trying to think of who I have roll if the player is shopping and wants to see if a certain thing is in stock or not. I certainly have had the player roll instead of me sometimes if I was ambivalent, but didn't want the store to just become magic Christmas land. In other cases I might say it is just there or just not there based on how I picture the store. That feels somewhat akin to having a table in the book that gives what percentage chance each thing is in stock - and if such a table were there (instead of being generated on the fly in my head), I'm not sure if it matters if the PC rolls or the DM rolls. So the forge thing isn't that totally out there. But having all the locations be completely random feels different to me from having some that would certainly have it, some that certainly wouldn't, and some that might. If forges are a common occurrence, then a big chance of having it in that hex seems great. But if random forges in the woods are rare, then the chance should be small. --- The key to being a Bayesian is how the prior is set, and in many cases it makes all the difference.

 

[Thomas Shey]

In the sort of RPGing @Campbell is talking about, there isn't a "main thrust of the adventuring portion of a campaign".

That's what I'm asking him about.

Though I should note that it still seems--unclear. After all, in a purely sandbox game, what is the "main thrust of the campaign"? It seems like it at least mostly hits his requirements (depending on whether the GM is willing to actually do some work to integrate the PCs into the setting and not just assume they'll be footless wanderers).

@Campbell, can I ask you a question? Can you give an example of a campaign structure that would suit your desires? I'm not trying to back you into a corner, I'm just trying to see if I'm missing your point, since on the surface of it, it seemed to describe a big part of a lot of superhero games I've played in and run, but I'm getting the sense I may be missing the mark somewhere here, and I'm trying to figure out where.

 

[Umbran]

Mod Note:
Some of you are making this personal. This is not the place to discuss your personal assessments of each other's personality traits. Talk about the subject matter, not each other. Thanks.

 

[Thomas Shey]

I can definitely confirm from other posts that Thomas is one of those dangerous radicals who enjoys PF2 (and probably some other games).

Heck, even PF2e is a borderline case for me; I'm mostly the kind of person who plays/runs things like Savage Worlds, Fragged Empire and Mythras. I have more tolerance for the D&D sphere than I did for a couple decades, but its still far from my ideal except when I'm in just the right mood.

 

[Thomas Shey]

No they can't. They can oblige the GM to introduce some fiction, about what the PC recalls, which pertains to the forge and is relevantly useful.

I already posted an example upthread, of what a 10+ result that doesn't involve a forge existing might look like.

I'm not saying it can't be done; I'm just noting in the absence of any concrete information about the setting and story to date, it seems like the easy out for a GM is just to put the damn forge in. And if you have an easy out, I don't expect to not see it occur in the situation fairly often.

 

[Campbell]

Our games often use what I call the Vampire arrangement, although I have used it in games like RuneQuest, Worlds Without Number, Pathfinder Second Edition, D&D 4e, Exalted, Legend of Five Rings, etc. Basically play centers around a specific location all the player characters reside in or around. This place is important to them. Different player characters are positioned around different factions and have established relationships with each other, but are played as individuals rather than as a group. Sometimes they work together. Sometimes they work against each other. Sometimes they are unintentionally at cross purposes. Sometimes they just pursue different agendas.

Basically the city almost becomes like a dungeon. Each PC has connections, goals, relationships within the city that matter to them. Play becomes about seeking out those goals right here where they are at. Just interesting people living interesting lives. Player characters often either start with or achieve positions of prominence within the city.

It becomes the GM's job to basically play the city and its residents with integrity and sometimes shake it up. Like maybe an Abyssal arrives with a message from their Deathlord, precipitating all sorts of chain reactions throughout the city. Basically what I do as a GM is build webs of NPCs, factions, and intrigue around the player characters. This often spills over to the other characters.

I'm at heart a Vampire kid even if all that Golden Rule stuff never made any sense for my own games.

 

[Ovinomancer]

Combat is resolved like a contest, with multiple tests/actions to get to an outcome (who wins). Spout Lore is a single move to get to an outcome (what the character knows). This distinction is not false.

It is. The distinction of a contest is poorly posed. It's a complex, meaning many step, resolution process to reach a conclusion to the initial question posed. In the case of combat, this is simple - do we survive this encounter. In the case of the example of spout lore, or really any instantiation of spout lore, it's part of the extended process of play that's just as complex as combat. Blades has a useful construct here in the idea of the score. While Blades doesn't have a spout lore move, the idea that a score is a complex resolution process to answer a question, like combat, is there and we can imagine something like spout lore taking part in that process. This correctly cites spout lore not as an independent bit, but more akin to an individual round in combat were you progress or do not progress towards your end goal.

The distinction you're drawing is more one of habituation -- combat is a place in D&D (and similar games) were the resolution of play zooms in and you have strong system say in that resolution (after the GM has blessed it, of course). The rest of play does not have this focus or strong system say and is quite often dealt with in a simple process of a single check. In this framework, combat feels different because of that zoom and strong system say. It's not actually different, though, outside of this. And spout lore really needs to be situated in the larger play. Arguably, this applies to 5e as well, in that a pick locks check isn't isolated either but is, in fact, part of a larger resolution process to answer a larger question. It's really that sudden zoom to a tighter pixel count in combat that makes it seem different.