D&D General Supposing D&D is gamist, what does that mean?

[Micah Sweet]

That’s a good question! But I think it’s most useful to examine it in another light.

Where would the players have any idea about who gets to author quests?

Does the PHB say “the GM will craft a story and you’re to follow along and contribute only by making decisions for your character”?

Why is the default expectation that the GM has all authorial power, except the bit that’s granted to the players at character generation (which is still subject to GM approval, of course)?

Why do players need explicit permission to come up with their own quests, but not explicit instruction to just play a part in the GM’s story?

I would think any game, whichever way it went on the matter, would instruct the participants how it should work via the rules and the processes of play.

Because D&D has never been designed to be that kind of game. It can certainly be played that way. Doing so makes for a different game, as the legend of 4e attests. Nothing wrong with it, of course, but definitely a different game.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Well, my answer would be "if you only think GMs read DMGs, I have a bridge to sell you." But perhaps that's not true with some groups.

I think a lot of players (like, a lot) don't even read the PH.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

Even though I've disagreed that there's a brightline between what GNS Story Now does and older Dramatist practice, I do have to agree there's some significant differences here. As I put it in all kinds of things, "Degree matters."

I agree that there is a difference, but I don't think that Campbell's description quite captured it. Personally I would see how no myth is employed as the most crucial difference from more traditional RPGs.

 

[hawkeyefan]

Because D&D has never been designed to be that kind of game. It can certainly be played that way. Doing so makes for a different game, as the legend of 4e attests. Nothing wrong with it, of course, but definitely a different game.

So you're saying that the inclusion of this type of thing in the text of the game is significant? That it can make for a different experience when playing? You wouldn't agree with the idea that such text is a "throwaway line"?

And do you think that the history of design has led to the expectation that this is how a game will play? That the way previous editions were written and designed as a whole have led to this kind of default stance of "this is how D&D plays"?

 

[Ovinomancer]

“If you can’t explain it to a six-year-old, you don’t understand it yourself.”

It's super easy to get people that don't already believe they know how games work to grasp and understand Story Now play. The difficulty comes in when the person you're explaining to is highly motivated to find any fault they can.

SN is very simple. Players make characters with a strong question they want to explore about that character. For example, my Stonetop character has a few, but the forefront one is "will Dap maintain his sense of hope in the future?"

The GM's job is to do just enough to put these questions front and center in play. For example, the GM can challenge Dap by offering a situation where maintains hope requires great risk, or where pragmatism gives some other reward.

Play is then about resolving these situations and seeing what happens-- can Dap maintain hope? What costs will Dap pay for it? Now multiply that by the other questions we have about Dap and then all the other PCs, especially when they conflict.

This is story now.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

I do think graduating from "an optional thing in a follow-up core book" to "directly present in both the player-facing and DM-facing initial core books" is an important step up. Do you have a page citation? I skimmed through the 3.5e DMG2 and couldn't find anything about this (and it isn't mentioned in the unfortunately very brief index.) As for your requested response...

I do think that there's even MORE to it, that is 4e defines 'quest' in a highly formal way, its an actual game mechanic, not just a concept. In fact, if you read the DMG writeup on quests, they are described as being a CENTRAL game mechanic, that the game is FORMED OF quests. You can certainly downplay them, and never bother with defining any, but that means you aren't really playing 4e as it was envisaged (though again, sadly, the published adventures don't exactly do much for us here).

I honestly just don't have much to say about this. As stated previously, I think GNS was important for highlighting issues and was heavily shaped by the time in which it grew (where what I have called Score-and-Achievement remained overwhelmingly dominant, but both Simulation and Emulation were growing). I just think that it has some faults, in part because it lumps together things that I think should stay separated. As I said, it to me reads like an attempt to explain how there was a space of playable possibility that had up to that point gone untouched. I suppose you could argue that that was some kind of "prediction," but it felt more like formulating the theory so that the already-known, already-felt absence could have a name and a shape. Without its rise, I think many games played today would still be played as they are, there just would be fewer (and less fully) coherent statements we could make about them and what they're trying to do.

Honestly, I am in a bit different camp. I think GNS outlines a set of principles by which game designs can be measured and analyzed with a goal of increasing their 'coherency'. The prediction here would be "If you build a game which is GNS coherent, it is more likely to be a successfully playable game in the way the author intends." or something like that. I've directly applied lessons which I garnered from examining how GNS categorizes games and applying those lessons to actual de novo game design. I've also taken lessons from stuff that Vince Baker has said, and from other people, as well as, maybe even primarily, by playing and reading various games and looking at how they ACTUALLY WORKED (for which these analytical toolboxes are really invaluable) and then reproducing those elements in a new design. I don't know how this could NOT be seen as one of the primary motives behind many of these theories. I mean, some of them might be more intended to inform PLAY vs game design, but its hard to imagine that if you have a way of talking about the elements of games, that you would not then apply those concepts when designing a game yourself! I'm not even sure it would be possible to not do that, it would certainly require significant cognitive dissonance!

 

[Thomas Shey]

I think a lot of players (like, a lot) don't even read the PH.

That might be true (it never was IME, but I'm not going to claim groups I played with are typical), but among those that did, it never seemed particularly unlikely they'd then avoid the DMG.

 

[Thomas Shey]

I agree that there is a difference, but I don't think that Campbell's description quite captured it. Personally I would see how no myth is employed as the most crucial difference from more traditional RPGs.

I could buy that.

 

[Thomas Shey]

So you're saying that the inclusion of this type of thing in the text of the game is significant? That it can make for a different experience when playing? You wouldn't agree with the idea that such text is a "throwaway line"?

And do you think that the history of design has led to the expectation that this is how a game will play? That the way previous editions were written and designed as a whole have led to this kind of default stance of "this is how D&D plays"?

Honestly, I suspect its largely an accident of design drift over time. From its origin D&D has bounced all the hell over the place from its focal points (which is part of what leads to some super-grump OS types, because its moved a fair bit away from what they expect). There have been a lot more hands pulling at the tiller than any other game on the market, after all.

 

[overgeeked]

I do think that there's even MORE to it, that is 4e defines 'quest' in a highly formal way, its an actual game mechanic, not just a concept. In fact, if you read the DMG writeup on quests, they are described as being a CENTRAL game mechanic, that the game is FORMED OF quests. You can certainly downplay them, and never bother with defining any, but that means you aren't really playing 4e as it was envisaged (though again, sadly, the published adventures don't exactly do much for us here).

No, they're not. And no, it isn't.

4E DMG, p102. "Quests are the fundamental story framework of an adventure—the reason the characters want to participate in it. They’re the reason an adventure exists, and they indicate what the characters need to do to solve the situation the adventure presents."

That's it. The rest of the section is about what their components are and how to put them together and how to use them. There's nothing even approaching the level of import you say is there. It's simply not. I get rose-colored glasses, but damn.