All i Really Care About is Interesting Choices

[Blue]

"Meaningful choices" may be an overly broad term for me. As in just about anything can be put into it. But at the same time, it ignores points which build up towards future fun and the like.

For example, an early-in-campaign shopping trip can be rather useful for allowing players to firm up their character personality, and to show them off to the others. The dynamics between the characters, and any drama that comes from it, can be a lot of fun at many tables. And you need to establish those.

Last session of a teen superhero game I am running had a scene where the team (as well as others) were given a parade and honored for helping save the city. There were no meaningful choices in this scene, but it was a payoff for the heroics they had done, acceptance of their new team as legit by the public, and introduction of several meaningful NPCs moving forward. The players greatly enjoyed this scene even though there was no meaningful choices.

 

[aramis erak]

Just an idle Saturday Morning Thought: as a GM, when I am running a game -- any game -- all I really care about is the players having meaningful choices to make at any given moment of play.

I agree that a game isn't fun without meaningful choices.

It's a metric I've used as part of my adventure design for over 15 years... and it's a good metric... but it's not a good sole-metric.

It's also subject to the vagaries of what the players find viable options and what the GM thinks they're accept. FOr me, he sweet spot is when the clear choices are ones that split party opinion on which ones are best... but they all agree any of the choices are viable... just disagreeing on the probable outcomes' tolerability.

 

[Reynard]

"Meaningful choices" may be an overly broad term for me. As in just about anything can be put into it. But at the same time, it ignores points which build up towards future fun and the like.

For example, an early-in-campaign shopping trip can be rather useful for allowing players to firm up their character personality, and to show them off to the others. The dynamics between the characters, and any drama that comes from it, can be a lot of fun at many tables. And you need to establish those.

Last session of a teen superhero game I am running had a scene where the team (as well as others) were given a parade and honored for helping save the city. There were no meaningful choices in this scene, but it was a payoff for the heroics they had done, acceptance of their new team as legit by the public, and introduction of several meaningful NPCs moving forward. The players greatly enjoyed this scene even though there was no meaningful choices.

I'm not saying that PC interactions don't matter, just that when I'm weighing options and making pacing choices, the meaningful decisions are going to get top billing.

 

[zarionofarabel]

My aim has always been to allow the players to engage in things they find interesting or entertaining. If the players wish to use an entire session to shop for supplies, or party it up in a local tavern, so be it, even if the choices they make have no consequences in future sessions. To me the whole point of RPGs is to have fun and enjoy a unique form of entertainment. While I do strive for the maximization of player agency, I love nothing more than knowing my players are having fun and are entertained by the game we are playing. If they wish to "waste time" on adding things to the narrative that have no consequence, so be it, it's fun for them. Every scene doesn't have to have lasting consequences in the long run, to try to force this metric would greatly detract from the entertainment of the game, IMHO.

 

[MNblockhead]

I generally don't roleplay all details of mundane shopping. A lot of it is actually handled between sessions. Players just tell me what they bought at the beginning of the session or in an e-mail between sessions. For some purchases, such as less rare magic items, I use the rules in Xanathars, but that is usually downtime activity handled between sessions. But I usually have certain NPCs that players can go to for more rare items. These will be role played. Whether it be the shady fence in the bad part of town or the mysterious being in the tower of bone with exerplanar connections. These NPCs generally have their own interests they try to use the players to advance and are as much a source of quests as they are opportunities for trade.

 

[delericho]

I'm not sure I follow. Are you saying shopping can be fun, or that it can be meaningful?

It can be both. 'Fun' should be fairly obvious - just as "retain therapy" is a thing IRL, it can be in-game.

To be 'meaningful', you really need a few things: the PCs need to be heading off on a reasonably 'known' expedition (so they have some parameters on which to choose what to buy), they need a fairly tight limit on what they can get (be that limited gold or limited carrying capacity), and they probably need it to be a one-time opportunity - so once they leave the market and begin their exploration into the Temple of Elemental Evil, they can't easily get back to Hommlet to change their gear.

 

[delericho]

Just an idle Saturday Morning Thought: as a GM, when I am running a game -- any game -- all I really care about is the players having meaningful choices to make at any given moment of play.

I tend to agree. I wouldn't say that's all I care about, but it's high on the list.

I often find myself cutting stuff out of play that others might consider "immersion" because there's no meaningful choice to be made. Roleplaying shopping is one good example...

I don't agree so much with this. One of the consequences of my having really short sessions in recent years is that we've dropped almost everything that is extraneous, and it's something that I sorely miss. Quite a lot of that contributes to world-building and serves to 'hide' some of the gameyness of the experience. Cut it back too far and something is missing, IMO.

Other times I remind myself to make otherwise arbitrary choices meaningful, like the dungeon intersection problem. There MUST be clues about what might lie in either direction, otherwise the choice is meaningless.

Agree 100%.

 

[Reynard]

I don't agree so much with this. One of the consequences of my having really short sessions in recent years is that we've dropped almost everything that is extraneous, and it's something that I sorely miss. Quite a lot of that contributes to world-building and serves to 'hide' some of the gameyness of the experience. Cut it back too far and something is missing, IMO.

To be clear, I wasn't saying "do it this way." I was actually kind of lamenting cutting out all that "meaningless" play, upon self reflection.

 

[Grendel_Khan]

Really interesting post/thread @Reynard . I agree so much that I've started to dive into systems where the mechanics are all about this kind of focus--where you only roll, generally speaking, when a player makes a risky choice. And also where you skip past a lot of the logistics and drudgery, sometimes using mechanics to fill in those gaps later (like when you do a flashback in FitD to say you brought a given item or talked to a certain person before the mission started). The older I get, the less interested I am in sessions that have no impact or momentum. Most movies and TV shows cut past the filler--why not do that with RPGs too?

But I've seen GMs who maybe take that too far, sacrificing RP opportunities and forgetting that RPGs are like most other narrative mediums--they thrive on great, or at least memorable characters and character interactions. FitD games use a lot of mechanics to work through downtime, which is great, but some GMs see those phases as a checklist to be raced through. That approach means recurring NPCs don't get developed, PC relationships remain static (a definite shame given how that system supports low-level PvP), and the whole setting feels less lived-in and familiar.

Plus, downtime scenes are where some great PC decisions can happen, especially the kind that seem minor in the moment but have ripple effects for the whole campaign. It's hard to know when and how much to slow things down, while still putting that emphasis on decision points.

That said, if I never have another pointless interaction with a shopkeeper, I'll be happier for it.

 

[Reynard]

Really interesting post/thread @Reynard . I agree so much that I've started to dive into systems where the mechanics are all about this kind of focus--where you only roll, generally speaking, when a player makes a risky choice. And also where you skip past a lot of the logistics and drudgery, sometimes using mechanics to fill in those gaps later (like when you do a flashback in FitD to say you brought a given item or talked to a certain person before the mission started). The older I get, the less interested I am in sessions that have no impact or momentum. Most movies and TV shows cut past the filler--why not do that with RPGs too?

I don't think you need special mechanics for things like this. I thing traditional RPGs do things fine as long as everyone is on the same page.