D&D 5E [+] Explain RPG theory without using jargon

[Charlaquin]

I dont know the official rules but I know some expectations. For example, if someone posts a question like "What are your favorite Monk builds +" its not ok to post about how you hate the term and idea of builds. Nor is it ok to say its impossible to make a monk build because they suck. Essentially, you are being asked to participate in spirit of the thread and not try and dismantle the concept and/or be negative about the OP.

I don’t think there are any official rules for “+ threads.” I’m pretty sure it’s just an etiquette thing. By putting + in the title, a poster is expressing that they want to keep the discussion positive, requesting that if people take issue with the premise of the thread, they simply not participate in it. As far as I know there’s no rule against ignoring that intention and request, it’s just kind of a jerk move.

 

[overgeeked]

I don’t think there are any official rules for “+ threads.” I’m pretty sure it’s just an etiquette thing. By putting + in the title, a poster is expressing that they want to keep the discussion positive, requesting that if people take issue with the premise of the thread, they simply not participate in it. As far as I know there’s no rule against ignoring that intention and request, it’s just kind of a jerk move.

I thought it had actual rules with an expectation of increase moderator responsiveness, but that's apparently not the case.

 

[Ovinomancer]

I thought it had actual rules with an expectation of increase moderator responsiveness, but that's apparently not the case.

Being rude is against the rules. So, while there isn't a formal mechanism, there's an informal one.

 

[Charlaquin]

It does not. This persists, and I've already addressed it twice before in this very thread.

GNS is about player agendas -- what a player wants from a game. You can have whatever agenda you want with whatever game, but you may not get well served. Some games do intentionally specialize in serving an agenda -- hence Story Now games. Most games can serve two agendas in some form. No game really serves three. Games that serve multiple agendas either have mechanics that can be drifted to better serve an agenda or they have toggle points where they switch. 5e is an example of the latter, where it is mostly about simulating the GM's story, but when combat happens you drop into more gamist subsystem. This is often referred to as the "combat whoosh" and is a noted shift in emphasis.

So, no, games are not exclusively one or the other. People aren't, either. The exclusivity point of the theory is only that, in a given moment of play, you cannot serve more than one master as primary emphasis. I agree with this, as it aligns well with my experiences from both before and after I was aware of the theory.

Ok, your theory makes the positive assertion that there are three “agendas” and a game can only serve one of them at a time. Though it seems we’re now beyond explaining the theory without use of jargon.

It's not, because the challenge here is referring to challenging the player. This is a player agenda, so they're the ones looking to get this from play. In the challenge mode (gamism) the player is looking to be challenged in their play, to deploy skillful play, and to be able to conclusively win or mark points. Losing has to be available as well, for the challenge to exist.
This isn't at all about character, and the challenges that address a character's dramatic needs, or the things that the character defines themselves around, aren't this same kind of challenge. What's happening here is taking a word with multiple meanings and connotations and using that to blur and shift meanings and add ambiguity. It's one reason why jargon can be extremely helpful because it prevents this kind of misunderstanding.

The jargon is causing misunderstanding here. You say that a game can’t serve a desire for challenge and a desire to learn what a character would do when push comes to shove at the same time, and then redefine those terms in a way that makes it a true statement. But you can absolutely learn about the character through challenging the player.

No, it's really not. Combat in 5e can be very challenging -- it can scratch that gamist itch if done well. But to enable that, hitpoints are a huge part of that challenge -- skillfully managing this resource. But there's zero verisimilitude to hitpoints. If you dig into any class of thing you're going to assert, this duality shows up. For things to be about challenging the player, they don't also need to be firmly rooted in the believability of the game world. In fact, they often are only given a passing relationship.

They don’t need to, no, but they absolutely can be.

And this brings out another good point -- we're talking about what's most important and not saying that multiple things cannot be present in any form. In a challenge, verisimilitude can be present to the extent it doesn't detract from the challenge. The moment that a need to maintain verisimilitude steps ahead of the presentation of challenge, you've switch priorities. The simulation is being served now.

You’re presupposing the arrival of a moment where one priority begins to detract from the other. One could certainly design a game to avoid such conflicts of interest.

I'm not aware of these games. Like, seriously. The best I've seen are games that hand things off between priorities in a pretty good way. Blades in the Dark does this, with strong Story Now play but also room to move into some skilled play challenge orientation, especially with managing the strategic side of the game (which, interestingly enough, intentionally and clearly steps away from the story now engine that scores run on).

I have found that verisimilitude, challenge, and character (as you define it) are all quite well served by “old-school” D&D play - which is to say, location-based play focused on orienteering and resource management challenge with a strong emphasis on player skill.

Nope. This isn't challenge, because it's not addressing the idea of skilled play well.

It absolutely is. The skilled play is just in avoiding combat rather than overcoming it.

You might do this by adding a clear subset of mechanics and practices about how players can learn about upcoming encounters in a codified way (the player has to be able to leverage system and resources, not rely on GM grace),

Why? Why are system resources an essential component of challenge? That seems absurd on its face to me; especially in a high-verisimilitude context, navigating the world primarily through back and forth narration can be highly challenging to the player, with little to no mechanical involvement.

but 5e really doesn't have these features. On the other hand, a game of "see how long you can survive" does offer the ability to compare points, as it were, at the end, so that can work -- randomly roll some monsters and go. If that's your bag, go for it, but you're pretty explicitly tossed any consideration for verisimilitude out the window here, and certainly any story now, so I'm not sure this helps your point.

Hold on, why does “see how long you can survive” necessarily toss verisimilitude out the window? If the gameplay is set in a place where survival would be difficult, “see how long you can survive” absolutely serves verisimilitude, as well as challenge. And that challenge will inevitably lead to moments where you are forced to choose between bad outcomes, thus revealing how the character acts when push comes to shove.

This actually sounds like a full on simulationism agenda statement. You're again using challenge in an ambiguous way (not intentionally, I think). The intent here is clearly verisimilitude, in that verisimilitude will be the deciding factor if there's a conflict.

Verisimilitude can be prioritized without having to be the deciding factor on if there’s a conflict…?

 

[Ovinomancer]

Ok, your theory makes the positive assertion that there are three “agendas” and a game can only serve one of them at a time. Though it seems we’re now beyond explaining the theory without use of jargon.

No, a moment of play in any game can only serve one at a time. I've been clear games can serve up different agendas to different tables just fine. GNS isn't about games.

The jargon is causing misunderstanding here. You say that a game can’t serve a desire for challenge and a desire to learn what a character would do when push comes to shove at the same time, and then redefine those terms in a way that makes it a true statement. But you can absolutely learn about the character through challenging the player.

No, the use of common language is causing the misunderstanding. It's the ambiguous usage of "challenge" that's causing the issue. When I clarified this, you've pivoted to keep the focus on the theory being wrong without at all acknowledging the impact of the ambiguity or that I've tried to clarify it.

And I'm struggling to understand how you can learn anything about the character by challenging the player. If you challenge the player, you might learn something about the player, but the only way the character would be impacted would be if the player decided to project themselves onto the character. That's still about the player, though, so... help?

They don’t need to, no, but they absolutely can be.


You’re presupposing the arrival of a moment where one priority begins to detract from the other. One could certainly design a game to avoid such conflicts of interest.

Yes, good, okay, great. This is exactly what I'm looking for as proof to disprove my assertion! Where is this game?

Because, otherwise, you're engaging in speculation that a thing must be possible without any evidence it is. I'm not going to say it's not possible, but I don't have evidence, either. I've looked. And I'm still looking.

I have found that verisimilitude, challenge, and character (as you define it) are all quite well served by “old-school” D&D play - which is to say, location-based play focused on orienteering and resource management challenge with a strong emphasis on player skill.

Oh, no, not even at all. This is, again, using ambiguity in the common terms to confuse the discussion. When you say "challenge" you don't mean what I've taken many pains to be clear about. When you say "character" you're doing the same. The pretend here is that we are talking about the same things. It's why jargon can be useful -- it makes it clear you aren't using these terms ambiguously.

It absolutely is. The skilled play is just in avoiding combat rather than overcoming it.

And, again, you have to have a system that enables this for it to be skilled play. 5e doesn't. Or rather, what 5e has is a system of the GM Says, both in how you can learn about things and how you can act upon them successfully. There's very little meat to 5e outside of combat and spells that isn't just GM Says. It's in the core game loop. So, it's very hard to operationalize challenge so that players can leverage the system and their game resources to overcome challenges in a skilled way.

And that's not at all a bad thing, because 5e serves up High Concept Simulationism -- meaning it does a great job of letting the GM represent the causal factors and outcomes of the world in a believable way -- but doesn't really serve up much else because it's hinged so much of it's system on giving the GM the power to do the HCS well. Combat can support a gamist agenda, and you can lean into that and drift the game into this, but it's very hard to avoid having the GM act as the world and make rulings this way.

Why? Why are system resources an essential component of challenge? That seems absurd on its face to me; especially in a high-verisimilitude context, navigating the world primarily through back and forth narration can be highly challenging to the player, with little to no mechanical involvement.

Because you keep using challenge ambiguously. When you sit down to play chess, the challenge is apparent -- can you, as a player, leverage the system and resources to win? Same with many wargames. B/X does a pretty good job of presenting a system that can be leveraged -- you have to manage the wandering monster check, you know how to score points (XP, treasure), you have character side resources (inventory management, hitpoints, spell load out, hierlings) to deplete and use. 5e has almost none of this, or very paired down versions (mostly because they aren't "fun"), and hinges most everything on the GM's judgement. So, challenge isn't going to be about things the players can see and understand and leverage, and know what their risk spaces are, but rather are about what the GM says the world does. If you do not have a system to support the challenge, it's not really challenge but being entirely reactionary to the GM. You can't push, and shape, and win.

Look, here's a good example. Take 4e, which very strongly engages a gamist agenda. Many of it's powers do not care to establish a prior condition for their results before the power can be used. This breaks with verisimilitude because the cause is not before the effect. Instead, the effect is chosen (the power) and then the cause of that effect has to be backfilled. 4e totally supports gamist agendas, but has little to support simulationism agendas because it's not very concerned with establishing cause and effect patterns. And this bore out in the discussions about 4e.

Hold on, why does “see how long you can survive” necessarily toss verisimilitude out the window? If the gameplay is set in a place where survival would be difficult, “see how long you can survive” absolutely serves verisimilitude, as well as challenge. And that challenge will inevitably lead to moments where you are forced to choose between bad outcomes, thus revealing how the character acts when push comes to shove.

A randomly rolled set of encounters, played until the characters die, and then you mark score and see which players get bragging rights supports verisimilitude? Maybe we need to look at that word, because... what?

Verisimilitude can be prioritized without having to be the deciding factor on if there’s a conflict…?

Verisimilitude can be prioritized without prioritizing it? What?

 

[braro]

I want to try a specific attempt at describing some RPG theory/terms without jargon - I am curious at how this one reads:

Exception Based Rules Design

When you are making the game, you give the player a broad set of rules that apply to the whole game system. However, you also specify that other rules may counter go against these rules. You communicate to the players that this will happen, and that when it happens, the smaller rule is what is used.

Game designers use this to avoid having to make their core rules have to corner cases, and also to allow them to add new elements over time.

 

[Charlaquin]

No, a moment of play in any game can only serve one at a time. I've been clear games can serve up different agendas to different tables just fine. GNS isn't about games.

I thought “at any given moment” was implied in my statement, but ok. We’re on the same page here as far as what the theory asserts. I will note though that if we drill all the way down to moment-to-moment play, the assertion ceases to have much utility.

No, the use of common language is causing the misunderstanding. It's the ambiguous usage of "challenge" that's causing the issue. When I clarified this, you've pivoted to keep the focus on the theory being wrong without at all acknowledging the impact of the ambiguity or that I've tried to clarify it.

The jargon is causing the misunderstanding because it is using common language in a technical way. If by “challenge” you mean something other than the common meaning of the word challenge, it’s on you to illuminate what the heck you are using it to mean.

And I'm struggling to understand how you can learn anything about the character by challenging the player. If you challenge the player, you might learn something about the player, but the only way the character would be impacted would be if the player decided to project themselves onto the character. That's still about the player, though, so... help?

The player decides what the character does. Challenging the player can put them into a position where they must make difficult decisions for the character - choosing between two things they want when they can only have one of them, or choosing between two things they want to avoid when they can only avoid one of them, as very stripped-down examples.

Yes, good, okay, great. This is exactly what I'm looking for as proof to disprove my assertion! Where is this game?

Because, otherwise, you're engaging in speculation that a thing must be possible without any evidence it is. I'm not going to say it's not possible, but I don't have evidence, either. I've looked. And I'm still looking.

Like I said, I’ve found old-school D&D play to be pretty good at it.

Oh, no, not even at all. This is, again, using ambiguity in the common terms to confuse the discussion. When you say "challenge" you don't mean what I've taken many pains to be clear about. When you say "character" you're doing the same. The pretend here is that we are talking about the same things. It's why jargon can be useful -- it makes it clear you aren't using these terms ambiguously.

The jargon can certainly be useful, among people who are all familiar with the jargon. In mixed company, it causes confusion, especially when the jargon uses common terms. I’ve been trying to operate under the definition of character you provided: revealing how the character acts when push comes to shove. This is something that I find challenging gameplay to be exceedingly good at doing. You push, and you shove, and you put the character into difficult positions (such as being deep in enemy territory with dwindling supplies) and you make the player decide what their character is going to do. If by challenge or character you mean something else, you’ll have to elaborate because from my understanding of what you’re saying, these two things are closely intertwined.

And, again, you have to have a system that enables this for it to be skilled play. 5e doesn't. Or rather, what 5e has is a system of the GM Says, both in how you can learn about things and how you can act upon them successfully. There's very little meat to 5e outside of combat and spells that isn't just GM Says. It's in the core game loop. So, it's very hard to operationalize challenge so that players can leverage the system and their game resources to overcome challenges in a skilled way.

I think 5e actually does have pretty solid operational exploration rules, but they are kind of buried and most DMs ignore them even if they are aware of them. There were a couple threads on “5e’s hidden exploration rules” recently.

And that's not at all a bad thing, because 5e serves up High Concept Simulationism -- meaning it does a great job of letting the GM represent the causal factors and outcomes of the world in a believable way -- but doesn't really serve up much else because it's hinged so much of it's system on giving the GM the power to do the HCS well. Combat can support a gamist agenda, and you can lean into that and drift the game into this, but it's very hard to avoid having the GM act as the world and make rulings this way.

I’m not clear on what “high concept simulationism” is, but I do think if you utilize the exploration rules and actually track things like encumbrance and ammunition (which do exist as rules in 5e even if they too tend to go ignored), use random encounter rolls, observe the encounters per day guidelines, etc. there is indeed a solid, challenging exploration gameplay loop in D&D 5e, if that’s what “supporting a gamist agenda” outside of combat means.

Because you keep using challenge ambiguously. When you sit down to play chess, the challenge is apparent -- can you, as a player, leverage the system and resources to win? Same with many wargames. B/X does a pretty good job of presenting a system that can be leveraged -- you have to manage the wandering monster check, you know how to score points (XP, treasure), you have character side resources (inventory management, hitpoints, spell load out, hierlings) to deplete and use. 5e has almost none of this, or very paired down versions (mostly because they aren't "fun"), and hinges most everything on the GM's judgement.

5e has all of that. But, again, a lot of it is buried, a lot of it is marked as optional, and often it gets ignored.

So, challenge isn't going to be about things the players can see and understand and leverage, and know what their risk spaces are, but rather are about what the GM says the world does. If you do not have a system to support the challenge, it's not really challenge but being entirely reactionary to the GM. You can't push, and shape, and win.

I don’t think “challenge” is a great term for what you’re describing if challenge that doesn’t arise from a system doesn’t count, but I think I at least understand what you mean by it. And I still think it’s a great way to reveal what characters do when push comes to shove. I also think that the systems which deliver this challenge can be designed with an eye towards verisimilitude. I believe that’s where the term “gygaxian naturalism” comes from - his advice to try to give the dungeon an internal logic.

Look, here's a good example. Take 4e, which very strongly engages a gamist agenda. Many of it's powers do not care to establish a prior condition for their results before the power can be used. This breaks with verisimilitude because the cause is not before the effect. Instead, the effect is chosen (the power) and then the cause of that effect has to be backfilled. 4e totally supports gamist agendas, but has little to support simulationism agendas because it's not very concerned with establishing cause and effect patterns. And this bore out in the discussions about 4e.

Ok, so in much the same way that your definition of “challenge” doesn’t include challenge that arises from GM fiat instead of a mechanical system, your definition of “verisimilitude” doesn’t include internal logic that is backfilled from the gameplay outcomes. I’m starting to see why you would think these things can’t be satisfied in the same moment of ganeplay, but also the utility of that statement is seeming smaller and smaller.

A randomly rolled set of encounters, played until the characters die, and then you mark score and see which players get bragging rights supports verisimilitude? Maybe we need to look at that word, because... what?

Why does it have to be nothing but a series of random encounters? I thought we were talking about gameplay where the challenge is in seeing how long you can survive. That could be done by, for example, playing characters in the middle of a desert with very limited supplies. That’s challenging (and you could have rules surrounding the need for and usage of these resources to satisfy your definition of challenge), it’s verisimilar (the challenge of survival is well-aligned with the fictional scenario), and it would reveal what the characters would do when push comes to shove - as supplies get low, the players have to decide what their characters will do to deal with that challenge.

 

[Cadence]

I want to try a specific attempt at describing some RPG theory/terms without jargon - I am curious at how this one reads:

Exception Based Rules Design

When you are making the game, you give the player a broad set of rules that apply to the whole game system. However, you also specify that other rules may counter go against these rules. You communicate to the players that this will happen, and that when it happens, the smaller rule is what is used.

Game designers use this to avoid having to make their core rules have to corner cases, and also to allow them to add new elements over time.

Is this how lots of games are explained. Start with the very simple: "How do pawns move in chess." "How do pawns capture in chess." Only later to find out about double moves if at the starting position and even later for en-passant?

 

[EzekielRaiden]

You’re presupposing the arrival of a moment where one priority begins to detract from the other. One could certainly design a game to avoid such conflicts of interest.

I'm not really intending to have a horse in this race, but this specific comment seems...really weird to me.

How can this not happen?

100% serious here. How is it possible to design something where "the intuitive and naturalistic nature of the imagined world is the ultimate goal, exceeding (nearly) all considerations of both gameplay difficulty and compelling narrative experiences" can definitely always avoid running into conflict with "the gameplay difficulty, and overcoming that difficulty in an interesting and entertaining way, is the ultimate goal, exceeding (nearly) all considerations of both intuitive naturalness of the imagined world and compelling narrative experiences"?

As you said (and I agree), a player may still value all these things to one extent or another. But surely it must be the case that (say) the difficulty of overcoming a mechanical situation cannot be both the most important concern and not the most important concern in the same sense, of the same thing, at the same time? In a single action or moment, something is most important. A game may fluidly move between concerns (which introduces other potential problems, but that's a different story altogether), but it must in fact move between them; it cannot simultaneously be wholly committed to intuitive-and-natural imagined-world experience and wholly committed to difficult-but-rewarding gameplay-skill experience.

In general I have phrased this in some way like "it requires an enormous gain of X in order to justify a  small sacrifice of Y." E.g., many players who like 4e value that it's got a really solid, reliable mathematical backbone. Any change of focus which intends to promote greater naturalness or a heightened sense of "I am a main character facing main character difficulties" cannot be too careful about preserving that solid reliability. Of these two concerns, the latter is more compatible, so many folks have argued that these two reasons players play ("Gamism" and "Narrativism") can both be pursued within 4e to some degree of effectiveness, while the other ("Simulation") is generally neglected and hard to implement without fighting against how the system was designed and implemented.

 

[Charlaquin]

I'm not really intending to have a horse in this race, but this specific comment seems...really weird to me.

How can this not happen?

100% serious here. How is it possible to design something where "the intuitive and naturalistic nature of the imagined world is the ultimate goal, exceeding (nearly) all considerations of both gameplay difficulty and compelling narrative experiences" can definitely always avoid running into conflict with "the gameplay difficulty, and overcoming that difficulty in an interesting and entertaining way, is the ultimate goal, exceeding (nearly) all considerations of both intuitive naturalness of the imagined world and compelling narrative experiences"?

Woah, those are some pretty extreme statements! Why must a game make either the ultimate goal that exceeds nearly all other considerations? I see no reason a game can’t pursue both an intuitive, naturalistic world and gameplay difficulty. In fact, I think a good game ought to do so, to the extent neither interferes significantly with the other.

If one does end up interfering with the other, the game designer has a choice: prioritize one or the other, or avoid the conflict.

As you said (and I agree), a player may still value all these things to one extent or another. But surely it must be the case that (say) the difficulty of overcoming a mechanical situation cannot be both the most important concern and not the most important concern in the same sense, of the same thing, at the same time? In a single action or moment, something is most important. A game may fluidly move between concerns (which introduces other potential problems, but that's a different story altogether), but it must in fact move between them; it cannot simultaneously be wholly committed to intuitive-and-natural imagined-world experience and wholly committed to difficult-but-rewarding gameplay-skill experience.

Why ever commit wholly to one or the other? A game can have multiple priorities.

In general I have phrased this in some way like "it requires an enormous gain of X in order to justify a  small sacrifice of Y." E.g., many players who like 4e value that it's got a really solid, reliable mathematical backbone. Any change of focus which intends to promote greater naturalness or a heightened sense of "I am a main character facing main character difficulties" cannot be too careful about preserving that solid reliability.

Hang on, I thought the character focus was about finding out what the character would do in difficult situations, not promoting a sense of main-character-ness.

Regardless, sure, balance is an important part of what most 4e fans like about 4e, and a sense of a naturalistic world isn’t. Does that mean those things can’t both be priorities for a different game, or heck, even for a group playing 4e? I don’t think so, but the GNS categories, intentionally or not, promote a perception that they can’t.

Of these two concerns, the latter is more compatible, so many folks have argued that these two reasons players play ("Gamism" and "Narrativism") can both be pursued within 4e to some degree of effectiveness, while the other ("Simulation") is generally neglected and hard to implement without fighting against how the system was designed and implemented.

And yet I, a huge 4e fan, get told my play priorities sound like “pure simulationism.” Clearly there’s a significant flaw in the framework.