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

[Manbearcat]

Just a quick note about Skilled Play + difficulty + interactivity of Inventory/Loadout.

* Torchbearer is the most difficult game, the most Skilled Play demanding game, I've ever GMed. It has an intricate Inventory system and everything is codified up front (Tools mean a particular thing, Supplies mean a particular thing, and particular things - rope/sword/rations - mean particular things). Its Inventory paradigm is somewhat akin to B/X though significantly more demanding in terms of engagement, cognitive load, and skillfull management (significantly so).

* After Torchbearer, Blades in the Dark is next most difficult game, the most Skilled Play demanding game (if run correctly...and I've seen signs that GMs aren't doing so), I've ever GMed. Blades is not like Torchbearer when it comes to Inventory/Loadout. You choose your Loadout before the Score. You can discretionally pull Playbook, Crew-specific, or General items up to your Loadout box max during the Score and you can even Flashback for special things (but you're going to spend 1 or 2 Stress for this depending upon how special the thing is/how hard it is to come by). This does not remotely make the game easier than D&D. Not even in the same universe. D&D 5e is a trivial walk-in-the-park compared to Blades in terms of difficulty. An aggressively mapped/stocked and skillfully run B/X dungeon or hexcrawl game will be difficult. But it does not rise to the level of low Crew Tier Blades in the Dark difficulty (particularly when the Crew is Tier 2 or less...and ESPECIALLY Tier 1 or less and ESPECIALLY ESPECIALLY Tier 1 or less and At War) from the players side of things.

Further (and finally), picking and managing your Loadout based on the prospective Score/obstacles to be navigated and resolved is extremely demanding from a Skilled Play perspective. This doesn't turn the game into EZMode. It adds a layer of intensive complexity + demands for skillful strategy (throughline from Engagement to Payoff) & tactics (managing each obstacle/scene within a Score). Anyone thinking this makes the game easier or less engaging, needs to course correct their thinking (this is best done by playing!).

---

So intricacy + up-front codification of Inventory/Loadout does not correlate directly to game difficulty or the demands of playing Skillfully to successfully navigate challenges. You have to consider the game in its whole.

So make autobiographical claims about "but my immersion" all day long. No one can deny you a personal testimonial that Blades in the Dark Loadout/Inventory system ticks your personal mental model in a jarring way (it doesn't do that for everyone...but if it does for you...cool) in a way that B/X (or even Torchbearer...even though its Slot-based rather than weight) or AD&D etc doesn't.

But inventory management doesn't always correlate to difficulty or Skilled Play demands. For instance, hand-waving inventory or "we care about inventory now but who knows when/if that will be a thing at any given random point in the future" is definitely not a component of Skilled-Play-Via-Inventory D&D. Its actually anathema to Skilled-Play-Via-Inventory. For Inventory/Loadout to matter toward Skilled Play (again, not "but my immersion"), procedurally it has to be consistent, clear, and impactful (always and ever "on" and a known quality).

 

[Thomas Shey]

Sure, but I’d say that’s likely a gut reaction more than a considered objection. RPGs are establishing all kinds of “past” details during play all the time. People don’t blink an eye at most of it.

I think you're underestimating the people who have the objection; I suspect most of them would object to establishing relevant details in other areas after the fact, too, unless they were details that simply couldn't be visible until later in process. Frankly, I'm not anywhere down their road, and I sometimes find that sort of thing jarring myself depending on what it is.

 

[hawkeyefan]

I think you're underestimating the people who have the objection; I suspect most of them would object to establishing relevant details in other areas after the fact, too, unless they were details that simply couldn't be visible until later in process. Frankly, I'm not anywhere down their road, and I sometimes find that sort of thing jarring myself depending on what it is.

I don’t think most would object to establishing relevant details after the fact because that’s how so much of RPGs work. Any kind of knowledge or lore skills or similar establishes the learning of information only once its relevance is introduced to the game. We simply accept this as a matter of convenience, and the scope of it makes it easier to justify.

But it’s really no different in the sense that both are examples of details being established after the fact. A rules system of some sort is used to limit how this after the fact information is applied. The difference is that one is easier to establish ahead of time than the other. It’s more a difference of degree rather than of kind.

If folks object to that specifically, that’s their opinion and we all have preferences, and that’s fine. But an objection to establishing details after the fact? Or describing an RPG as “needing” to establish things before hand? As I said, I view those comments more as a gut reaction.

 

[Cruentus]

With re: to equipment loadouts, its going to vary widely based on the "intent" of the game. A Basic/OSE game is likely going to run very different to a 5e game. In a multi year 5e campaign we played in, I never once had to go to my "inventory" for something useful. It wasn't that type of game. Carry tons of treasure. No problem. Travel incessantly. Sure. Dungeons? No problem. Light spell, Darkvision, etc. Create food and water, and so on. It wasn't a dungeon crawl. It wasn't survival based. It was high fantasy fighting dragons and things (and still no one came near death, ever), and mundane equipment didn't matter.

We're now playing Basic/Expert/OSE, and it sure a heck matters. Travel takes time. Travel uses rations. Travelling at night uses up torches and lantern oil. Didn't pack a grappling hook? Well, better find something that'll do, or figure another way around it. No rope? Oops. Going to make that descent rather dangerous. And here, it does matter. Weight is a thing. Carry capacity is intentionally baked in. You can only carry out what you can carry, and thats also XPs. Do I wear plate for the better AC, or Chain so I can carry more? Do I bring an extra sword? That's weight. Differently, these decisions are also made (in our game), based on doing some recon of the area we're going - what might we face, what might the hazards be, what might we need? Its not just wandering around randomly looking for adventure, or jumping into something just to jump into it.

It sounds to me like Blades, and Torchbearer have the systems they do for equipment, because that's a strong focus of the game play (Blades even mentions a "score", which in DnD would be like the thief deciding to go on a heist). You'd outfit differently based on what you're getting yourself into.

Anyway, I tried to rework 5e into something more OSE, and every change caused cascades that caused more cascades. For its simplicity, adding or removing things has impact far beyond the thing being tweaked or house ruled. I gave up after two years of trying to make it work. Its just built with too much inherent in the classes.

So we've gone back to basics, love the simplicity of it, everyone gets a single action each round, we protect the wizard (cause later he'll be protecting us), we pay attention to inventory, and it works for our table. We're likely never going back to 5e, its moved past us.

 

[overgeeked]

With re: to equipment loadouts, its going to vary widely based on the "intent" of the game. A Basic/OSE game is likely going to run very different to a 5e game. In a multi year 5e campaign we played in, I never once had to go to my "inventory" for something useful. It wasn't that type of game. Carry tons of treasure. No problem. Travel incessantly. Sure. Dungeons? No problem. Light spell, Darkvision, etc. Create food and water, and so on. It wasn't a dungeon crawl. It wasn't survival based. It was high fantasy fighting dragons and things (and still no one came near death, ever), and mundane equipment didn't matter.

We're now playing Basic/Expert/OSE, and it sure a heck matters. Travel takes time. Travel uses rations. Travelling at night uses up torches and lantern oil. Didn't pack a grappling hook? Well, better find something that'll do, or figure another way around it. No rope? Oops. Going to make that descent rather dangerous. And here, it does matter. Weight is a thing. Carry capacity is intentionally baked in. You can only carry out what you can carry, and thats also XPs. Do I wear plate for the better AC, or Chain so I can carry more? Do I bring an extra sword? That's weight. Differently, these decisions are also made (in our game), based on doing some recon of the area we're going - what might we face, what might the hazards be, what might we need? Its not just wandering around randomly looking for adventure, or jumping into something just to jump into it.

It sounds to me like Blades, and Torchbearer have the systems they do for equipment, because that's a strong focus of the game play (Blades even mentions a "score", which in DnD would be like the thief deciding to go on a heist). You'd outfit differently based on what you're getting yourself into.

Anyway, I tried to rework 5e into something more OSE, and every change caused cascades that caused more cascades. For its simplicity, adding or removing things has impact far beyond the thing being tweaked or house ruled. I gave up after two years of trying to make it work. Its just built with too much inherent in the classes.

So we've gone back to basics, love the simplicity of it, everyone gets a single action each round, we protect the wizard (cause later he'll be protecting us), we pay attention to inventory, and it works for our table. We're likely never going back to 5e, its moved past us.

Exactly so. And this mirrors my time with 5E quite well. What I want from D&D is not what 5E can provide and it’s more hassle than it’s worth to hack it into something that works. So I stopped my years long 5E West Marches game to switch to OSE or AD&D. All but two of the players only want 5E so I have to start from scratch building up a stable of players. 5E’s vestigial wargame bits just do not mesh well with the superhero fantasy game it clearly wants to be.

 

[Cadence]

I don’t think most would object to establishing relevant details after the fact because that’s how so much of RPGs work. Any kind of knowledge or lore skills or similar establishes the learning of information only once its relevance is introduced to the game. We simply accept this as a matter of convenience, and the scope of it makes it easier to justify.

But it’s really no different in the sense that both are examples of details being established after the fact. A rules system of some sort is used to limit how this after the fact information is applied. The difference is that one is easier to establish ahead of time than the other. It’s more a difference of degree rather than of kind.

If folks object to that specifically, that’s their opinion and we all have preferences, and that’s fine. But an objection to establishing details after the fact? Or describing an RPG as “needing” to establish things before hand? As I said, I view those comments more as a gut reaction.

From a gameplay perspective, the things in 5e about asking if you have a particular contact in an area based on your background, or if you know a certain thing based on your skill, or adjusting to have an item you almost surely would have carried but forgot to write down, sound at least vaguely in the ballpark to the loadout to get an item from a short list.

It feels like they recognize that surely the player doesn't know everything in the characters background and can't remember every little detail, but they don't require the player to narrate something out of the linear time structure during play.

Consider some different DM responses to a D&D player asking if his character knows any contacts in the bar he just entered (in the city he lives in and has streetwise for but hasn't RP'd much in yet ):
(a) The DM says "sure, you know <makes up name> over in the corner from some past work and found him helpful before" and then lets the character go ask questions about the current circumstances
vs.
(b) The DM says "sure, you know <makes up name> over in the corner from some past work and found him helpful before" and then asks the player to RP some small talk with them about this shared past you need to make-up on the spot before asking the questions
vs.
(c) The DM says "sure, tell me who they are and how you know them" and then letting them ask the questions.
vs.
(d) The DM saying "Sure, we're near the end of the session and will get to it next time. This week, send me who you meet there and what you did with them in the past. Unless it's bonkerballs we'll run with that."

Things like (b) and (c) just disrupt the feel of fantasy RPGs for me - I have to step out of just thinking about my character in the here and now and start narrating other people in the world and maybe even the past. Even after playing it quite a bit, I still don't like 13th Age's montages and similar things.

It also feels cognitively differently to me to ask what I could have done in the past to make the current situation manageable than it does to ask what should I do right now.

Of course I can't pre-kill the person I'm currently talking to, but I could put have broken in and replaced their bullets with blanks. So it might not be the kind of time travel that let's you go kill the genocidal monster as a baby and change the present, but is it distinguishable from one of the time travel types where anything you do in the past was already done there?

Similarly, is the flashback loading of a non-standard item indistinguishable in play from having a magic item that can produce just about anything once in a while if you can tell a good story as you pull it out? (Batman, for the first time ever, pulls a vacuum sealed steak out of his utility belt to distract the hungry dog, telling Robin "Why I scouted the place out yesterday and came prepared today!")

To be fair, it seems like it would be odd to jump to thinking of time travel and magic bags if one was told in advance "it's like a heist movie where there are flashbacks showing things", although it apparently was enough of a concern that the BitD writers felt the need to point out it wasn't time travel. But in a fantasy world that might have time travel or magic bags?

I wonder if it is related to being annoyed when fair play mystery rule 8 isn't followed (where the detective in a story has access to a clue that the reader wasn't let in on). Or if it is related to preferring a super hero comic book series where the next story is foreshadowed gradually over the issues coming before it (common in the Avengers of the late 1970s) instead of the issue having a flashback that was never foreshadowed or seen before to justify something.

 

[Thomas Shey]

I don’t think most would object to establishing relevant details after the fact because that’s how so much of RPGs work. Any kind of knowledge or lore skills or similar establishes the learning of information only once its relevance is introduced to the game. We simply accept this as a matter of convenience, and the scope of it makes it easier to justify.

Yeah, but most of that is not usually potentially contadictory or ""things we should have known before". Some (including the matters at hand) are. That makes a difference to a lot of people. Where the line is is somewhat subjective, but that doesn't make it any less real.

But it’s really no different in the sense that both are examples of details being established after the fact.

Again, if you can't accept its very much different to some people, this conversation is going to keep going in circles. Telling people "this is the same thing, it shouldn't bother you" is about as useless a response as is possible in this sort of thing, even if that's the way it feels to you.

A rules system of some sort is used to limit how this after the fact information is applied. The difference is that one is easier to establish ahead of time than the other. It’s more a difference of degree rather than of kind.

If folks object to that specifically, that’s their opinion and we all have preferences, and that’s fine. But an objection to establishing details after the fact? Or describing an RPG as “needing” to establish things before hand? As I said, I view those comments more as a gut reaction.

That's your view, but they're not required to agree with you. I'm not sure I do myself and I'm far more flexible about this sort of thing than the people objecting.

 

[Thomas Shey]

With re: to equipment loadouts, its going to vary widely based on the "intent" of the game.

Its not even just an issue of intent (though that absolutely matters). For a long time D&D and its close kin have had magic as, to one degree or another, the all purpose power tool. That creates struggles not only about gear but about the utility of skills and the like. A game with a much more limited range of magic, either in general or in what a small group can manage is going to make necessary non-magical tools much more significant. Even early D&D tended to be more brusk than a number of games I can name in this regard.

 

[hawkeyefan]

From a gameplay perspective, the things in 5e about asking if you have a particular contact in an area based on your background, or if you know a certain thing based on your skill, or adjusting to have an item you almost surely would have carried but forgot to write down, sound at least vaguely in the ballpark to the loadout to get an item from a short list.

It feels like they recognize that surely the player doesn't know everything in the characters background and can't remember every little detail, but they don't require the player to narrate something out of the linear time structure during play.

Things like (b) and (c) just disrupt the feel of fantasy RPGs for me - I have to step out of just thinking about my character in the here and now and start narrating other people in the world and maybe even the past. Even after playing it quite a bit, I still don't like 13th Age's montages and similar things.

Really? When I walk into a pub, I'll know myself if I'm familiar with anyone there. I don't need to turn to anyone else and ask "do I know anyone here?"

I think a lot of this depends on the context, whether it's the character's hometown, or a strange new land will matter quite a bit, as will the mechanics that the game uses to determine these things (if any).

It also feels cognitively differently to me to ask what I could have done in the past to make the current situation manageable than it does to ask what should I do right now.

Sure, I think that's likely the sticking point for many.

But why would that not apply if you make a nature check in a game like D&D to determine that a plant you've found is poisonous? What makes that different?

Of course I can't pre-kill the person I'm currently talking to, but I could put have broken in and replaced their bullets with blanks. So it might not be the kind of time travel that let's you go kill the genocidal monster as a baby and change the present, but is it distinguishable from one of the time travel types where anything you do in the past was already done there?

A Flashback can't retcon what has been established, no; your understanding of that is correct. You can't kill the guy, but you can do something like replace his bullets (if it's feasible to do so and you make an applicable action roll, etc.).

But again, it helps to think of the game like you would a book or a movie. Does anyone think time travel happened in Pulp Fiction? Or any similar media are things are presented out of linear manner? Peaky Blinders is another example. There are always things that are happening, and then later we get scenes that show us other things that happened, that lend a new context to the current events.

The thing is that time in the game is as fictitious as any other element of the game world.

Similarly, is the flashback loading of a non-standard item indistinguishable in play from having a magic item that can produce just about anything once in a while if you can tell a good story as you pull it out? (Batman, for the first time ever, pulls a vacuum sealed steak out of his utility belt to distract the hungry dog, telling Robin "Why I scouted the place out yesterday and came prepared today!")

There's an expenditure of resources involved... usually in the form of Stress and an inventory slot, which are limited to 3, 5, or 6 for Light, Medium, or Heavy loads, respectively. So getting past this dog obstacle better be worth that use of available resources.

In that sense, it is very much like the use of a spell like charm person in D&D used to avoid a combat. You have to decide is this spell slot a better use than attacking, etc.

This is why I view it as a different test of player skill.

To be fair, it seems like it would be odd to jump to thinking of time travel and magic bags if one was told in advance "it's like a heist movie where there are flashbacks showing things", although it apparently was enough of a concern that the BitD writers felt the need to point out it wasn't time travel. But in a fantasy world that might have time travel or magic bags?

Yeah, this is all known going in. The game specifically wants to deliver these kinds of elements. I do think that viewing them in the context of D&D can be a bit odd because they're not a kind of baked in part of the genre.... but then, D&D doesn't really have a specific genre. If you were going to play an Eberron campaign where the players were all members of a thieves guild, well then something like Flashbacks might fit perfectly.

 

[Cadence]

Really? When I walk into a pub, I'll know myself if I'm familiar with anyone there. I don't need to turn to anyone else and ask "do I know anyone here?"

Right, you look around and see who is there. And whoever is there is not there by your will or decision. Asking the DM if anyone I know is there mentally fills the roll of my looking around.

If I had created someone in the backstory who is likely to be there I might ask the DM if they're there.
Or if I'm a regular, I might say "I assume I know who the bartender is and go chat them up."
If the entire bar staff has been replaced by an outlaw gang I'd hope the DM would tell me know when I entered that no one looked familiar and I would take that as a very strange thing.

But why would that not apply if you make a nature check in a game like D&D to determine that a plant you've found is poisonous? What makes that different?

In real life when I'm on a hike and see a plant, I may know it well, be vaguely sure, have a guess, or not know. I don't get to decide what plant it is though or if I know it. The roll/check with the DM takes the place of my brain quickly dredging my memory. And if I know it, I probably don't mentally monologue to myself how I know what it is.

Seeing the plant, telling myself why I know it, and then knowing what it is feels different.

A Flashback can't retcon what has been established, no; your understanding of that is correct. You can't kill the guy, but you can do something like replace his bullets (if it's feasible to do so and you make an applicable action roll, etc.).

But again, it helps to think of the game like you would a book or a movie. Does anyone think time travel happened in Pulp Fiction? Or any similar media are things are presented out of linear manner? Peaky Blinders is another example. There are always things that are happening, and then later we get scenes that show us other things that happened, that lend a new context to the current events.

Yup!

The thing is that time in the game is as fictitious as any other element of the game world.

Sure, but it feels like we default to things that feel similar to the world usually (gravity, breathing, long distances taking time to travel, the arrow of time).

But if I'm playing superheroes I probably let a lot of physics go, don't worry about breathing in toon, fast forward through travel to the good points in 13th age, and would probably jump back in time in a heist.

There's an expenditure of resources involved... usually in the form of Stress and an inventory slot, which are limited to 3, 5, or 6 for Light, Medium, or Heavy loads, respectively. So getting past this dog obstacle better be worth that use of available resources.

In that sense, it is very much like the use of a spell like charm person in D&D used to avoid a combat. You have to decide is this spell slot a better use than attacking, etc.

This is why I view it as a different test of player skill.

I can totally see why it's a test of skill!

I'm not sure likening it to a spell makes the case of it not being a very different thing though.

Yeah, this is all known going in. The game specifically wants to deliver these kinds of elements. I do think that viewing them in the context of D&D can be a bit odd because they're not a kind of baked in part of the genre.... but then, D&D doesn't really have a specific genre. If you were going to play an Eberron campaign where the players were all members of a thieves guild, well then something like Flashbacks might fit perfectly.

Definitely agree.

I appreciate everyone in this thread (including you) who has convinced me I want to try something with flashbacks at some point!!