The GM is Not There to Entertain You

[Reynard]

Spencer from Harmonquest: "You do that."

I see. I don't think that is particularly satisfying from a play perspective, though.

 

[AnotherGuy]

The rules matter. Whether the GM obeys them or not doesn’t.

I believe the frequency with which the GM obeys the rules (whether RAW or Homebrewed) plays a major role.
Also we may have differing view on what disobeying rules is.

For me it would have to be a pretty big infraction and & which made no in-game sense.
Increasing a monster's health by 20hp or giving it an additional Legendary Action or advantage on an attack for something in game is not breaking the rules in my book.

 

[Mannahnin]

I see. I don't think that is particularly satisfying from a play perspective, though.

I believe the "you do that" is a response to "we try to sneak along the wall", or "we try to sneak along the wall and stay hidden while the ritual goes on", rather than a declaration that the entire plan works and the prisoners are now free. Although I guess it could be.

My adjudication would usually include a little more enthusiastic narration, adding some details and color/drama, even if the fundamental ruling is "yup, your plan to get there worked and you're now at the cages, apparently undetected".

 

[Reynard]

I believe the frequency with which the GM obeys the rules (whether RAW or Homebrewed) plays a major role.
Also we may have differing view on what disobeying rules is.

For me it would have to be a pretty big infraction and & which made no in-game sense.
Increasing a monster's health by 20hp or giving it an additional Legendary Action or advantage on an attack for something in game is not breaking the rules in my book.

I think intent matters. If the Gm does those things to make the game more fun, it is a positive. If they do it because they are mad that the PCs are winning, it is bad. As someone who is CONSTANTLY out played (tactically) by my players (I'm just not a great tactician), I am always trying to do the former without doing it because of the latter.

 

[Reynard]

I believe the "you do that" is a response to "we try to sneak along the wall", or "we try to sneak along the wall and stay hidden while the ritual goes on", rather than a declaration that the entire plan works and the prisoners are now free. Although I guess it could be.

My adjudication would usually include a little more enthusiastic narration, adding some details and color/drama, even if the fundamental ruling is "yup, your plan to get there worked and you're now at the cages, apparently undetected".

I think there are inflection points ina description of action like that, places where interesting stuff can happen depending on how things go. I tend to want to take it one step at a time, up to each inflection point, and see what happens based on the dice and the choices the players make.

 

[Ovinomancer]

Take it however you want.

The way I understood his explanation was that the GM in AW does not have the same authority to conduct the trad loop of explain-listen-explain. So I was musing and thinking that the model seems like a reasonable base for a GM-less game, since you can use procedural generators to "make life hard for the PCs."

Yes, he was saying the game has a different structure to play. This loop doesn't make sense for how AW plays at all -- it doesn't play like this. This question is like asking why players in Risk aren't buying properties and charging rent because that's how Monopoly works.

But feel free to continue to respond in bad faith.

I'm not the one that opened this by asking if another game isn't just better off with charts. Your questions aren't coming across as actually interested in learning about a different game that plays very differently, but rather looking to find ways to dismiss and belittle it.

 

[Ovinomancer]

I believe the frequency with which the GM obeys the rules (whether RAW or Homebrewed) plays a major role.
Also we may have differing view on what disobeying rules is.

For me it would have to be a pretty big infraction and & which made no in-game sense.
Increasing a monster's health by 20hp or giving it an additional Legendary Action or advantage on an attack for something in game is not breaking the rules in my book.

It would be in mine. Absolutely, 100% of the time. Whether or not it's acceptable to the social contract of the table, though, is open. We can give permission to change the rules, and even permission to one person to have great leeway to do so. but this authority comes from the social contract at the table and does not inhere to a game role. The game role of GM is given their authorities by the rules of the game. I'm fundamentally floored that a game role defined by rules is somehow completely free of them and yet retains the authorities defined by the rules. And that this authority is being leveraged up to above the table social contract!

 

[Mannahnin]

I think there are inflection points ina description of action like that, places where interesting stuff can happen depending on how things go. I tend to want to take it one step at a time, up to each inflection point, and see what happens based on the dice and the choices the players make.

Sure. But whether it's more satisfying from a play perspective to stop and play out each little step or to swish cut ahead past the smaller details to the next potential or actual crisis point is kind of a matter of taste.

IME taking it one step at a time is a pretty common approach in D&D (which is what I'm most familiar with), but I can definitely see how running or playing in the previously-described AW situation would be fun and suspenseful, while playing faster.

 

[AnotherGuy]

It would be in mine. Absolutely, 100% of the time.

Lets put social contract aside for the sake of conversation.

The hit points listed in the MM are the average, therefore one could technically increase them.
If you (as a player) had not read the MM, and fought a creature, and the DM played it differently (additional Legendary Action) and you would only discover this while reading the stats of the creature post game, would you then accuse the DM of cheating or breaking the rules?
Do you never amend monsters as DM?

To be clear I'm not talking about Adventure League games. In that constructed game format I'd expect all to play the rules down to the T.

 

[Campbell]

Apocalypse World is absolutely dependent on GM judgement in terms of framing the situation, resolving consequences, shifting the spotlight from player to player, what sort of GM move is appropriate to keep the situation moving forward that both follows the fiction and puts the appropriate level of pressure on the appropriate player's character. In general when running Apocalypse World I am making judgement calls approximately every minute of play. They're just different ones.