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

[AbdulAlhazred]

I just posted the below quoted text in that "Midieval Europe Travel Thread:"



* Which do you (fair readers) think represents the majority or consensus orientation to play of that thread?

* What do you think the "hierarchy of controversial approach" would be given the orientation of the participants in that thread (and 5e at large)?

Oh, there's a range of approaches which shades between 1 and 3. You will have some people who may have been around long enough to know about things like B/X or 1e hexcrawl techniques, and maybe actually use them, but I'd be surprised if there's more than a tiny number of people that actually systematically use a system like that, besides it has to be heavily adapted to work with 5e. More likely you get people who do a few sporadic checks here and there and basically what happens is based on some mix of expediency, setting tour, and mild challenge coupled with participationist concerns (3 basically but maybe with some traces of 1). I doubt that 2 is even contemplated except possibly by one or two posters, at most. It just doesn't fit with the model of play that D&D proposes. Certainly WotC LONG AGO seems to have decided that supporting people who want to play that way is not something 5e is going to do. I'd even say it is systematically discouraged!

 

[clearstream]

I find this hard to follow. But you seem to be positing that because adherence to rule X is motivated by reason Z, it is therefore permissible, or even desirable, to suspend or override rule X whenever someone believes that doing so will better advance reason Z.

I go a bit further than that, I think. One might read a rule like Rule 0 and think something like this

"Aha! I grasp that rule, and I see its consequences, and thus if another upholds it I will be able speak to that with accuracy."

That runs into a conflict when one is using that grasping to make arguments as to the undesirability of following that rule. One may come to think something like this

"Why are these fools following Rule 0, when it is so patently unappealing?!"

Do those fools understand Rule 0 to be unappealing but follow it anyway!? Or do they follow it out of plain ignorance of its consequences? Perhaps they find the unappealing, appealing in some way - a matter of taste? All of these are possible, but they are also problematic. They skirt reliance on a challengeable assumption that one's own position is one of holding the high-ground (hence I call them "fools" so that we are clear what ignorant persons of questionable taste they must be.)

Alternatively, their grasping of the rule - and this is what I believe @Thomas Shey and I have been essentially saying - is one that has appealing consequences. The choice of following and the manner of following (the rule that is followed) are not neatly divided. [This is a narrow claim, specific to game rules.]

Those fools are grasping and upholding an appealing version of Rule 0 that is not identical to the unappealing version grasped and upheld by those up there on the high ground. (Note that there is no reason to suppose those fools are insensitive to possibilities such as accepting that the sting of loss adds pleasure to future victories: they need not be unsophisticated fools.)


EDIT Just to note that I wrote that way in attempted humour, and not mockingly. I hoped to get some ideas across, but with some levity. Less heavily and sternly in opposition. More to build upon.

Look at Vincent Baker's example of the fight to try and get to the departing ship on time. The player (via the play of their PCs) wins the fight - their PC "kicks the other guys butt". But does the player get to the ship? In Classic Traveller, 5e D&D, Rolemaster and CoC - just to point to a few example systems - that question is answered by a GM decision. The decision may be made in various ways, and typically may have regard to the PC having kicked the other guy's butt, but the GM makes the decision.

Now consider a 4e skill challenge, where the stated goal is to get to the ship before it departs. Winning the fight will count as a success in the challenge. So the connection between winning the fight and getting to the ship before it departs is not hostage to GM decision-making.

Wtih that all in mind, would you say that a group that chooses to not accept/enact Rule 0 for themselves (which is more common in neo-trad 5th edition play) therefore evades these problems? Or at least, is not committed to them.

 

[niklinna]

Right, and this is a way that maybe a system like that has an advantage over, say, 4e, where the analog would be embedding a fight in an SC (or vice versa perhaps).

Torg Eternity pretty much does that by default. Dramatic Skill Challenges (as they call them) nearly always happen in the context of a fight.

Torg Eternity is a mess. Not only does it mash together genres, but players have "possibilites" they can spend to gain extra die rolls (similar to inspiration), and a hand of cards that can similarly affect die rolls, or introduce (little-n) narrative things like a romance with an NPC, not being seen by guards, being mistaken for a significant NPC (shenanigans!), a wandering-monster encounter, or finding a clue....

It's actually kinda fun to toss a card out and have the GM go, "Well! I wasn't counting on that!" and see how they turn it into a good time anyhow.

 

[clearstream]

I think it's widely accepted that Carroll didn't really think that inference is impossible. Rather, his point is that rules of inference do not themselves constitute premises in the argument. Frege made a similar observation, I think.

As a total aside, I have been wondering if Carroll might have been thinking about pragmatic a-priori? Drawing attention in the fable to a necessary locating of agreement in a principle held prior to or external to the regress (that principle, in fact.)

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

We did a good bit of 'Wilderness Exploration' in the first 5e campaign I was in. My character's avowed ambition was to carve out a realm and build a way for travelers to go between various areas. So, this was a significant plot point, but in terms of rules, there isn't anything that is super workable. The load/encumbrance/travel/economy kind of rules combination doesn't exist which in 'classic' D&D forced you to make hard decisions between trying to get pack animals vs porters, guards, or just lug all your stuff yourself, and what it would all cost in terms of scarce gold pieces that would then become risky assets (IE its a real bummer when Rocs fly over and decide all your mules are good eating). There was never any question of our PCs SURVIVING either, even at low levels the cleric and wizard together were more than capable of magically dealing with ordinary logistical issues (besides, we were like 4th or 5th level by the time we really got going, its not like advancement is slow in 5e...).

Even when we blundered into some nasty tactical situation, which happened a couple times, it was something the GM came up with, and we just regrouped and headed back to base. It is quite possible in something like a 1e hexcrawl to wander off the end of the point of no return, helped by some friendly orcs who nabbed half your stuff! Nothing even close to that kind of thing will happen in 5e, not by RAW. There isn't even really a set of rules that would mediate that. I don't know about ToA or whatever, but IMHO the issue is less about what is NOT there than it is about what IS there. Spell casting is WAY more flexible in 5e than in 1e!

Honestly, I don't even think you can actually produce a narrative of 5e wilderness exploration as-written, there are some individual rules for certain specific things, but no overarching framework. To contrast, 1e DMG provides EVERY minute detail of how such an exploration works! Literally every factor is covered, and the general rules dovetail pretty well with it! Lower level spell casters are quite helpful, but have built-in limiters, the economics and other systems clearly got tested together as a whole, etc. You can hexcrawl, and it could be fun, but most of all it is pretty darn close to its own mini-wargame where all the basic procedures and things are covered quite well. Nothing like that is true of 5e IME. Even if it incorporated every added rule that 1e has which it is missing, you'd not have a system that would actually do what you want!

 

[Campbell]

When I speak to rules or system, I'm speaking to the one actually used at the table. Not what's written in the text. When I speak rules being binding or having teeth I am speaking to clarity of permissions, expectations and a means to hold each other accountable. I am speaking to the actual structure of play based on both experience of the culture of play as well as the instructions provided by the text.

I am also deeply uninterested in what counts as what game from a technical perspective. We can all do whatever we want. I can't speak to any individual game of D&D just as I can't speak to any individual game of Monopoly. I can only speak to my observations, experience and interpretation of what the text says about typical play.

 

[clearstream]

To contrast, 1e DMG provides EVERY minute detail of how such an exploration works! Literally every factor is covered, and the general rules dovetail pretty well with it! Lower level spell casters are quite helpful, but have built-in limiters, the economics and other systems clearly got tested together as a whole, etc. You can hexcrawl, and it could be fun, but most of all it is pretty darn close to its own mini-wargame where all the basic procedures and things are covered quite well. Nothing like that is true of 5e IME. Even if it incorporated every added rule that 1e has which it is missing, you'd not have a system that would actually do what you want!

Can you cite the rules that make 1e better than 5e for running hexcrawls? What are the procedures and loops that aren't found in 5e and make it better? Or if they are found in both, can you give examples explaining how the 1e version is better?

I've grown curious to understand how D&D hexploration has been designed in the past, compared with now. What has been carried forward. What altered and abandoned (with the hope also of understanding why)?

 

[clearstream]

When I speak to rules or system, I'm speaking to the one actually used at the table. Not what's written in the text. When I speak rules being binding or having teeth I am speaking to clarity of permissions, expectations and a means to hold each other accountable. I am speaking to the actual structure of play based on both experience of the culture of play as well as the instructions provided by the text.

I agree that is a worthwhile position. I'm thinking of my experience of play, also.

I am also deeply uninterested in what counts as what game from a technical perspective. We can all do whatever we want. I can't speak to any individual game of D&D just as I can't speak to any individual game of Monopoly. I can only speak to my observations, experience and interpretation of what the text says about typical play.

I suppose here, when I identify that a game text includes X, and there is a statement to the effect that it does not, it can end up coming down to technicalities. Are the words actually there in the text? The interest in technicalities doesn't (for me at least) smother an interest in the emergent whole.

It's really true that we can't speak to individual games. And is typical play really all that important, either? I mean, if we want to play a typical RPG - the most typical - we'd be playing only 5e! It's the atypical play that (again, for me at least) is captivating. Minds work in many different ways though, don't they.

 

[Campbell]

@clearstream

You seem to be making an argument against clarity of expectation. Is that what you are trying to do here? What thesis are you putting forward?

 

[pemerton]

As a total aside, I have been wondering if Carroll might have been thinking about pragmatic a-priori? Drawing attention in the fable to a necessary locating of agreement in a principle held prior to or external to the regress (that principle, in fact.)

A principle would constitute a further premise. Unless by principle you mean rule of inference.

To put it in somewhat Wittgensteinian terms, any "agreement" is in respect of inferential practices, not propositions held to be true.