D&D 5E How do you define “mother may I” in relation to D&D 5E?

[pemerton]

This is where the GM’s conception of the setting is a huge part of it. If you decided “these elements are too silly or anachronistic for my super serious setting” then you’d likely have shot them down.

Which is something I think many folks posting in this thread may well advocate, though I can’t say for sure.

GMs being precious about their setting… their world… is a big part of many MMI issues.

I wouldn’t say never, because there are always exceptions. But I feel like such a decision is not one to be made lightly. If something hasn’t yet been established in play, then it’s possible. The GM should consider such suggestions seriously because this is literally the player saying “I want X to be part of play.” So saying no to that should have some strong reason behind it. More than “I didn’t imagine court jesters as being a thing in this world”.

At the same time, the players should allow the setting as it takes shape to inform their choices and desires.

Since the example @pemerton gave was from a one shot of In a Wicked Age, and early in the session when they were making characters, I don’t think the player requests were going against anything that had been established. At least not beyond the loose genre and name lists offered by the game as a default.

Also that the players were kids matters as well, I’d guess, and these kind of social considerations may be quite important.

I think with many RPGs, the setting can be held as paramount. But I don’t think it should be so, at least not as a default.

A few thoughts in response to these posts.

First, I agree that playing with kids makes a difference. I think it makes much more sense to go with what they're imagining, than to open up needless, and perhaps needlessly rancorous, discussions about what we should or shouldn't be imagining together.

Second, as you say it was a one-shot. Why waste time in a 2-ish hour session debating the garb the illusionist is wearing, or whether the brutal warlord has a Bond/Powers-esque cat?

Third, In A Wicked Age begins by drawing four playing cards and consulting the "oracles" - a table with a series of pithy entries describing trope-y, and thematically laden, people, places and events. Then the participants all go around the table, identifying characters implied (whether through express mention, or more obliquely) by the oracle results. Then the players choose a character each to play, and the GM gets the rest as NPCs. There's also a list of example names, although in our session I was the only participant to take names from that list. The others just made theirs up.

So there is no setting in the FR-ish sense, independent of this process.

Fourth, a reason why preciousness about setting can produce "Mother may I" issues is because it is often assumed that the GM will use their knowledge of the setting as a basis for adjudicating player suggestions, including gating things like costume and pets (and other higher-stakes things too). In A Wicked Age doesn't rest on that assumption - for a start, as per point three just above, there is no asymmetry of knowledge between GM and players!

The GM is expected to frame scenes, and to say what their NPCs are doing. The players say what their PCs are doing, and this can include introducing coherent content into scenes too (eg Romulus's player, when she wanted Romulus to kill someone, introduced his "wall of axes" from which he took one to do the killing - this seemed to cohere well enough with Romulus being a tyrannical warlord in his camp). The game only moves from this sort of consensual resolution to mechanics when too characters come into non-verbal opposition (fighting, or one hiding or running from the other, etc).

A 5e D&D GM who wants to reduce the degree of "Mother may I" in their play could consider some of these points and how they could be applied in 5e D&D. 5e D&D is more prep-heavy than In A Wicked Age, but it doesn't need FR-level setting stuff to work. There's no reason why players can't introduce elements like costume, social conventions, etc. And there's also no reason why players can't at least suggest coherent content for scenes, for PC's knowledge, etc. If the GM doesn't want to simply say yes, they can set a DC and call for a check!

 

[FrogReaver]

I think it if doesn't, then the ability is pointless. On the premise that background features are not intended to be pointless, it must generate some constraint.

I would agree with the logic but not your premise. If the ability doesn't constrain the GM in some way then it's pointless! I agree. Yet, IMO that ability constrains the GM by having it be true in the fiction that the common folk hide the PC's unless their lives are threatened. Nothing more is constrained.

 

[pemerton]

I would agree with the logic but not your premise. If the ability doesn't constrain the GM in some way then it's pointless! I agree. Yet, IMO that ability constrains the GM by having it be true in the fiction that the common folk hide the PC's unless their lives are threatened. Nothing more is constrained.

I guess my point is that - if we further accept that the GM can introduce threats to the lives of the commoners more-or-less at will - then that's no constraint at all.

Hence why I don't accept what I've put between the dashes!

 

[FrogReaver]

I guess my point is that - if we further accept that the GM can introduce threats to the lives of the commoners more-or-less at will - then that's no constraint at all.

Hence why I don't accept what I've put between the dashes!

That makes more sense to me.

My answer: I think there's quite a spectrum between 'more-or-less-at-will' and 'not ever'. So please help me. How can I bring up the point for discussion that under certain circumstances the Gm can introduce threats to the lives of the commoners, and how can I do that without being accused of pushing for the 'GM being able to do that at will'?

 

[FrogReaver]

No. But neutrality - following on from @Campell's post - means your adjudication must follow from the fiction. And if it's not to be arbitrary from the players' point of view, the fiction from which it follows must be knowable or ascertainable in some fashion.

What I've been suggesting is that there are multiple potential fictions that can follow from the current fiction and that this is a common occurrence. The question I'm bringing up is about how a DM can neutrally adjudicate when this is the case. How do you propose a DM accomplishes this, or maybe you don't believe neutral adjudication is possible in a DM curated game when that occurs?

Also, I don't think neutral adjudication depends on perspectives with limited information.

This sort of neutrality is important in exploratory play. For instance, yesterday I had to make a decision about how many pack slots a stirge fills (when the PCs bagged two stirges in our Torchbearer game). On the principle that a full waterskin fills one pack slot, I decided that a stirge also fills 1 pack slot. So two stirges could fit in a small sack (capacity: 2 slots). This follows from fiction (that stirges are small critters), which the players are already familiar with. And it fits with the rulebook stating that domestic cats (another sort of small critter) taking 1 pack slot. And it is not too punishing to the PCs, and hence isn't likely to put any pressure on consensus over the adjudication.

The way I read this is that there was only one single fiction that could follow from the current fiction. That's not the case I'm asking about. You'd need an example with a larger creature. Something that could either make sense from the fiction as requiring 1 slot or 2 slots.

Another example I already gave was my decision to go along with a player's suggestion that he would use his Elven, Dreams-wise sword to help abjure a dream haunt (in mechanical terms, this counted as an improvised weapon which thereby avoided the penalty for being unarmed). It had been established in the fiction that the sword was aware of, and leading the PCs towards, the dream haunt (which was located within an Elfstone). Is it consistent with that fiction that the sword should be a useful implement for abjuring the haunt? The player clearly thought so, and it seemed to me that there was no reason to contradict that.

Better example. Do you believe the decision to go along with the players thoughts was a neutral adjudication and why? Would a decision not to go along with the players thoughts have been a neutral adjudication and why?

I think my view of neutrality is different than yours as I base it solely on whether the DM's adjudication follow from the fiction. I think either answer, yes or no, both follows from the fiction - though I can see a case for yes doing a better job at following from the fiction here. So I would have adjudicated yes because of that and because it was a cool idea.

In general, I think GMs have strong reasons to go along with the players' understanding of the fiction. I think this helps neutral exposition of the fiction: the GM can build on non-contentious foundations and elaborate on them.

A principle like 'when unsure go with the players idea' seems fairly solid most of the time - just maybe not all the time.

 

[FrogReaver]

I'm going to disagree here. The number of orcs will almost certainly depend on the notion of challenging the PC's and "integrity of the world" will almost certainly take a very far back seat.

I don't think the difference in 4 vs 8 orcs is going to impact the integrity of most worlds. That's why I think both the integrity of the world and choosing the challenging option can both be done simultaneously.

For example, it's pretty rare that a 1st level party would meet 30 orcs. Or 50. Or a hundred. That's not much different than "rocks fall, everyone dies!" It's a pretty rare DM that will do that, even if it makes perfect sense in the setting (after all, why is that marauding band of orcs conveniently sized to be faced by a party of X level characters, only growing in size when the PC's gain levels?)

I'd just note that even in non-D&D games the players don't face 'rocks fall you die' style odds. Are all those games prioritizing appropriately challenging the PC's over world integrity?

Does it matter if the DM chooses to do that or if it's baked into the game system itself?

And, again, you can't have it both ways. If we're presenting a world, then concepts of "challenging the PC's" don't have any place. So, choosing the scenario like ambushing the PC's in the barn makes very, very little sense. There are a hundred other things that could have happened that are equally as likely from the Duke looks in the wrong area, guards get confused by orders, or any number of equally plausible scenarios that don't result in the party being ambushed in the barn.

As I've consistently noted - there are times when challenging the PC's will definitely come into conflict with 'integrity of the world'. That doesn't mean they are always at odds though.

But almost universally, DM's will choose the "challenging/interesting story" option. However, "challenging/interesting story" most certainly isn't being faithful to the integrity of the world.

IMO, if one accepts my stance that choosing the challenging option in a given situation isn't necessarily at odds with upholding the 'integrity of the world' then it's much easier to understand how that occurs and why most worlds still feel like they've had their integrity upheld even when the DM adjudicates a challenges for the PC's.

 

[pemerton]

I think there's quite a spectrum between 'more-or-less-at-will' and 'not ever'. So please help me. How can I bring up the point for discussion that under certain circumstances the Gm can introduce threats to the lives of the commoners, and how can I do that without being accused of pushing for the 'GM being able to do that at will'?

If you're talking about the discourse in this thread, I guess with something like what I've just quoted?

For me, more interesting is the appropriate play technique, and accompanying advice. I think we already discussed this upthread. I think that a soft move from the GM, that enlivens the possibility of a threat to the lives of the commoners, is the better way to go. I think the GM deciding, "offscreen", that the commoners have had their lives threatened and hence that the ability is spent, is bad GMing.

And to make it clear: I'm making the above judgement within the framework of 5e D&D (as best I understand it). I think a soft move like this is the appropriate way to honour the ability - the players can declare actions that might avert the threats in whatever ways - while also maintaining the dynamic of the GM framing the PCs into threatening/challenging situations.

 

[FrogReaver]

Your characterisation of declaring actions is tendentious.

Consider the famous example from Donald Davidson ("Actions, Reasons, and Causes" (1963)):

I flip the switch, turn on the light, and illuminate the room. Unbeknownst to me I also alert a prowler to the fact that I am home. Here I need not have done four things, but only one, of which four descriptions have been given.​

IMO. I would say the person in that did 1 thing which caused 3 other things to occur. It's simply a causality chain. We generally attribute events within a causality chain to the initial actor provided the distance between cause and effect is small - one might even refer to this as assigning responsibility. So if someone says, 'I turned on the light', what they really mean is I was responsible for the light turning on. We could then trace back the steps of electrons reaching the light, electrons moving through the closed circuit, the circuit being closed, the switch being flipped that closed the circuit. Yet, the only action the person actually performed was flipping the switch, even though they were responsible for so much more.

I think this is probably a bit off topic - I just wanted to gather my thoughts on the topic.

 

[pemerton]

I'd just note that even in non-D&D games the players don't face 'rocks fall you die' style odds. Are all those games prioritizing appropriately challenging the PC's over world integrity?

It depends a bit which RPG you're talking about. A non-D&D game that is played in more-or-less the same way as D&D - eg some approaches to RQ and RM, even some approaches to Traveller - will exhibit the same thing that @Hussar diagnosed.

Once we get to games where the notion of "challenge" or "adventure" doesn't apply - eg HeroWars, or Burning Wheel, at least in many cases - then the issue goes away.

As an example, here is a summary of the last session of BW that I played - a two-player/two-participant game where we each made a PC, collectively established a background/context, and then shared GMing duties, each framing the adversity for the other's PC. We started on the docks, disembarking from a ship. The ship master was explaining why the crew - including the other player's PC, a Weather Witch - wouldn't be paid. I picked his pocket, and then suggested to the Witch that we find accommodation at an inn. The innkeeper turned me away, but took on the Witch as kitchen help. In the night, I sneaked into the inn and - with the Witch - went to rob the innkeeper of his strong box. At the moment of crunch, in the innkeepers bedroom, I went to stab him through the heart but hesitated (the other player insisted I make a Steel check, which I failed) and in the time of hesitation the Witch used a Persuasion spell on me, suggesting that I didn't need to kill him in order to get the money. So I let him live, but took the money and also his shoes (my PC had started barefoot).

In that sort of play, which is more about following the characters through their lives - naturally, lives with more drama and pathos and adversity than the boring lives of their players! - the notion of "appropriate challenge" doesn't come up in the same way, or put pressure on the integrity of the fiction.

That's not to say that the GMing is neutral! As you can probably see even from the brief summary, the GMing is about pressure, pressure, pressure . . . but by using the fiction and its integrity, not compromising or suspending it.

A contrast: Torchbearer is in the same family of games as BW, but completely different in this respect. It's a D&D-type game. Fictional integrity has to bend to the imperatives of designing adventures. The adventure I ran in my session on Sunday started with two contrivances - a chance encounter in the Phostwood with a friend's horse, laden with provisions; and the Dreams-wise sword strapped to the horse's saddle goading it towards a dream-haunted Dwarven Hall - and in a sense was contrivance through-and-through, designed to be interesting and fun for the players given their PCs.

What I've been suggesting is that there are multiple potential fictions that can follow from the current fiction and that this is a common occurrence. The question I'm bringing up is about how a DM can neutrally adjudicate when this is the case.

It's tricky. That's why I tend to either run with the players' ideas (or build a consensus with them via conversation), or call for a check. Unilateral decision-making that doesn't carry the players with it can cause needless problems.

Especially if the players then suffer a loss down the track in virtue of something the GM decided earlier, which they thought should have been otherwise!

Do you believe the decision to go along with the players thoughts was a neutral adjudication and why? Would a decision not to go along with the players thoughts have been a neutral adjudication and why?

I think my view of neutrality is different than yours as I base it solely on whether the DM's adjudication follow from the fiction. I think either answer, yes or no, both follows from the fiction - though I can see a case for yes doing a better job at following from the fiction here. So I would have adjudicated yes because of that and because it was a cool idea.

Well, as per your remark about multiple potentialities, I don't think it was mandated by the fiction. But it clearly wasn't contradicted by it. And the rules don't intend that it be hard for the players to have their PCs equip appropriate weapons, especially improvised ones. So to contradict the player would have been to adopt an adversaial rather than neutral approach, I think. Hence I do think it was neutral, although perhaps not the sort of neutrality that @Campbell had in mind.

 

[Hussar]

I don't think the difference in 4 vs 8 orcs is going to impact the integrity of most worlds. That's why I think both the integrity of the world and choosing the challenging option can both be done simultaneously.


I'd just note that even in non-D&D games the players don't face 'rocks fall you die' style odds. Are all those games prioritizing appropriately challenging the PC's over world integrity?

Does it matter if the DM chooses to do that or if it's baked into the game system itself?


As I've consistently noted - there are times when challenging the PC's will definitely come into conflict with 'integrity of the world'. That doesn't mean they are always at odds though.


IMO, if one accepts my stance that choosing the challenging option in a given situation isn't necessarily at odds with upholding the 'integrity of the world' then it's much easier to understand how that occurs and why most worlds still feel like they've had their integrity upheld even when the DM adjudicates a challenges for the PC's.

But, that's the problem though. Sure, 4 or 8 orcs isn't going to matter. How about 4 or 40? Obviously raiding parties of 40 or 50 raiders exist. Yet, funnily enough, my 1st level party will never, EVER meet them. Same way that my 1st level party will never meet a giant (barring some really corner cases).

I think that the whole notion of "integrity of the world" is a myth. It's something world building DM's tell themselves to keep up the illusion that that's why they make the decisions they do. So, yes, virtually all RPG's prioritize appropriate challenges over world integrity. That's why they are games. It's largely why I mostly reject the notion of "simulation" as a priority in RPG's. It's not. Simulation, or the "integrity of the world" will always, always take a far back seat to the game.