D&D 5E Combat as war, sport, or ??

[UngainlyTitan]

The more I think about it, the more I like @UngainlyTitan 's operational vs. protagonist schema.

For one thing, it has some explanatory power. Why does one of my players enjoy beating a tough enemy by 'cheating' with clever planning, while another is disappointed they didn't get a slap-down, drag-out fight? Both players are heavily invested in their characters and in role-play, but have differing agendas when it comes to expressing them.

I do think we have to be cognisant of the multiple 'axes' of difference in play here. Tactical play is suited to 'protagonist play', but really we're talking about tactical vs. operational as one axis, with protagonist vs. whatever (pawn?) as another. Also, keeping with the wargame analogy, I can imagine a scale that goes tactical <-> operational <-> strategic (= character building and long-term assets?).

I have been looking at it as more of a spectrum rather than a set of axes, but it is not a well-developed notion on my part. It came about in part as a response to a Matt Colville video and from watching Critical Role recently.

 

[tetrasodium]

Let me clarify something, because I think we have a misunderstanding. When I say that the Prussian officer corps had 'norms' or an 'ideology', I'm not saying that their ideas were useless and disconnected from reality. I am saying that their ideas were necessarily a form of (possibly false) knowledge. They bayonet charge example was hotly disputed right up into WW1, and only resolved after bitter experience. Wargaming is necessarily a mediated (and therefore 'false') experience; this doesn't mean it can't have any instructional value.

Unlike the Prussian officers, RPG nerds don't have a strong a common ideology (an idea about how things are) when it comes to the reality of their shared game world. The only way to create that is through lots of play, or by deferring to an authority (a rule, or the GM). I've certainly played and run enough GM-heavy games to know what this is like. Even for something as seemingly obvious as being hit by a bus, what does that look like? Some people survive such accidents, some do not.

As for philosophy: if I had a dollar for every time a discussion of RPGs became a discussion of epistemology, I'd have two dollars. Which isn't much, but it's weird that it happened twice.


I agree! As do a lot of historical wargamers. People who want a 'fair' tactical game they can win, or who want to feel like protagonists, probably don't.

The romans (and to a degree the mongols) set the rules of war with professional disciplined armies that brought advanced technology education & so on alomg with paying taxes to someone new but still getting to live & maybe live better rather than bands of reavers who caused commonfolk to fight for their lives

 

[GMforPowergamers]

For one thing, it has some explanatory power. Why does one of my players enjoy beating a tough enemy by 'cheating' with clever planning, while another is disappointed they didn't get a slap-down, drag-out fight? Both players are heavily invested in their characters and in role-play, but have differing agendas when it comes to expressing them.

this is an issue my table faces all the time... and it isn't the same players on the same side every time...

ok so lets say that I as a player set up a GREAT plan where the necromancer and the orcs go to war... and almost wipe each other out, and what is left of the winning side can not threaten the town maltia. It feels GREAT, but if Matt REALLY wanted to go fight the Necromancer it feels hallow. If 6 weeks later Matt arranges/negotiates for the Green Dragon to polymorph into an advisor and join the kings counsel, instead of us killing the dragon, I am sure he will feel GREAT, but if I REALLY wanted to hunt and kill a dragon I will feel let down.

Now both examples happened (although in 2 different campaigns) but it shows that sometimes it takes a bit of work to all be in agreement on HOW to handle a threat

 

[Umbran]

In that sense CaS is exhausting. So much easier to do CaW. You wander into an ancient dragon’s lair at 1st level and decide to attack it, well, that’s on you.

First level characters "wandering into" an ancient dragon's lair for combat in CaS is a degenerate, cherry-picked, theoretical construct, just like a CaW campaign, but the only encounters the party ever faces in the entire campaign are single, CR 1/8 kobolds. Yes, we can posit this, but it doesn't happen in practice.

Neither of these scenarios is a reasonable use of their forms.

 

[Fanaelialae]

I am way too conflicted on this... I hate the level drain effect, BUT i like the caution the fear of it had. I can throw whights that 'perm hp until SR' damage all day and not I nor any of my players are that worried.

Right, I would liken level drain to a video game where you lose significant progress when you fail (Rogue-likes). Once you've achieved significant progress, it can be extremely stressful. Which can be fun in its own way, but is also a massive turn off for some.

In Rogue, once you die that's game over. Doesn't matter if you've been playing 6 minutes or 6 hours. You're back to square one. This essentially ratchets up the tension the longer you play, because the longer you play the more invested time you have to lose. That said, from what I hear some folks play these types of games not to win but to find out how their character dies. For them, it might not be stressful, since their not so invested in their progress.

In Souls games, you get a second chance. If you die, you drop all of your souls (which are both used for leveling up and as currency) and go back to the last checkpoint. If you manage to return to where you died and pick up your souls, you lose no progress. On the other hand, if you you die before that, they're gone. It makes for tense "corpse runs", but generally less stressful gameplay than Rogue. For the record, I quite like Souls games.

Then you have games like the Fallout series, which let you save almost anywhere. As long as you remember to save (or autosave) you lose almost nothing when you die. Maybe a few minutes of progress. And if you're the type of person who dislikes losing progress, you quickly learn to save often. You can definitely still have tense moments in these types of games, particularly during a chaotic combat, but overall I would say it's less than what you get with the previous two.

I wouldn't mind level drain as much if it were more Souls-like. For example, if you slay the monster you get your levels back. 4e did something along these lines with the rust monster, where a destroyed magic item left behind residuum that could be used to craft new items. Maybe the residuum could end up in its belly, so that you need to hunt it down if it eats your magic item and escapes. But I wouldn't want to go back to old-school level drain (et al) because I feel like it had more downsides than upsides (though being scary/tedious was a strong suit for it).

 

[overgeeked]

Right, I would liken level drain to a video game where you lose significant progress when you fail (Rogue-likes). Once you've achieved significant progress, it can be extremely stressful. Which can be fun in its own way, but is also a massive turn off for some.

In Rogue, once you die that's game over. Doesn't matter if you've been playing 6 minutes or 6 hours. You're back to square one. This essentially ratchets up the tension the longer you play, because the longer you play the more invested time you have to lose. That said, from what I hear some folks play these types of games not to win but to find out how their character dies. For them, it might not be stressful, since their not so invested in their progress.

In Souls games, you get a second chance. If you die, you drop all of your souls (which are both used for leveling up and as currency) and go back to the last checkpoint. If you manage to return to where you died and pick up your souls, you lose no progress. On the other hand, if you you die before that, they're gone. It makes for tense "corpse runs", but generally less stressful gameplay than Rogue. For the record, I quite like Souls games.

Then you have games like the Fallout series, which let you save almost anywhere. As long as you remember to save (or autosave) you lose almost nothing when you die. Maybe a few minutes of progress. And if you're the type of person who dislikes losing progress, you quickly learn to save often. You can definitely still have tense moments in these types of games, particularly during a chaotic combat, but overall I would say it's less than what you get with the previous two.

I wouldn't mind level drain as much if it were more Souls-like. For example, if you slay the monster you get your levels back. 4e did something along these lines with the rust monster, where a destroyed magic item left behind residuum that could be used to craft new items. Maybe the residuum could end up in its belly, so that you need to hunt it down if it eats your magic item and escapes. But I wouldn't want to go back to old-school level drain (et al) because I feel like it had more downsides than upsides (though being scary/tedious was a strong suit for it).

No one’s arguing that everyone must enjoy that style. Only that it exists and that some find it fun. Likewise with CaS. It’s not everyone’s taste, but it is some people’s preferences. Neither is right or wrong. But they are a better or worse fit for people’s preferences.

 

[Aldarc]

I have been mulling on this as a result of these threads and a Matt Colville video. I am thinking that it is not really about combat but combat is the bifurcation point. One play style "Combat as War" is really about Operational Resource Management. By that I mean the use of diegetic resources (Inventory, environment, allies, intelligence (as in information about the enemy) to leverage an advantage in combat.
This supports a number of playstyles but the emphasis is on gritty. Combat is dangerous, the environment is dangerous and poor planning will kill you.
It is also about using resources not native to the character to prevail.

The other playstyle is what I call Protagonist style. This is the character is a hero, has a certain amount of plot protection and has the internal resources to prevail.
This supports any kind of narrative or story focused play (even if that story is an emergent story from some kind of sandbox) it is not easy for the DM to accidentally kill the PCs but still possible to set up challenging encounters and that 5e strongly supports this style. Particularly since I think this style strongly supports casual play.

I also believe that as long as D&D is designed with public playtesting it will favour this type of game.

I think to shift the game toward Operational Play, a number of steps would have to be taken. Separating hit point recovery from power recovery and rule options for both.
More detail on the math of the game, what is the expected damage output of a party per level and that of a CR x encounter and how to take into account action stealing effects to allow DMs to more finely tune encounters and to tell if their party is punching over its weight and by how much.

Yeah, I think that the divide is not so much Combat as War vs. Combat as Sport, but, rather, a conflict of D&D as Survival RPG or D&D as a Heroic Action/Character RPG.

 

[Fanaelialae]

No one’s arguing that everyone must enjoy that style. Only that it exists and that some find it fun. Likewise with CaS. It’s not everyone’s taste, but it is some people’s preferences. Neither it right or wrong. But they are a better or worse fit for people’s preferences.

Well, the argument has been for it to be in the game by default, which kind of means it is being forced on folks, whether they like it or not. At the very least, they have to opt out as a group, and that entails not being able to use certain creatures, unless alternate stat blocks are added. Back in the day when level drain (et al) was core, if the DM insisted on using it you either sucked it up or voted with your feet.

On the other hand, it's easy enough to DIY those aspects back into the game. I literally posted three such features earlier in the thread, that could effortlessly be slotted onto creatures. To which the objection was that doing so makes the DM the "bad guy", so they would rather have it be core and have WOTC be the scapegoat for making those rules core in the first place.

I don't think anyone's saying that everyone has to like that play style. However, if it were to be made core again (despite that being incredibly unlikely) it would almost certainly be forcing it on players who don't like it. Or it would be avoided by the majority of players, in which case the game would be designed to cater to a niche group. All so that some DMs don't have to feel like the "bad guy".

 

[gorice]

this is an issue my table faces all the time... and it isn't the same players on the same side every time...

ok so lets say that I as a player set up a GREAT plan where the necromancer and the orcs go to war... and almost wipe each other out, and what is left of the winning side can not threaten the town maltia. It feels GREAT, but if Matt REALLY wanted to go fight the Necromancer it feels hallow. If 6 weeks later Matt arranges/negotiates for the Green Dragon to polymorph into an advisor and join the kings counsel, instead of us killing the dragon, I am sure he will feel GREAT, but if I REALLY wanted to hunt and kill a dragon I will feel let down.

Now both examples happened (although in 2 different campaigns) but it shows that sometimes it takes a bit of work to all be in agreement on HOW to handle a threat

Yeah, I've had the exact same problem. I think the system can help, here, by setting expectations and by making certain approaches more or less effective. Lancer, for example, has a fairly strictly codified system for translating fictional positioning before battle into tactical advantage in battle (and this is important, in a game that is very much a 4e-style tactical challenge/PCs as strong protagonists game).

One thing I've noticed about 5e is that magic items can be very powerful in some situations, completely negating some tactical challenges. I think you have to either be OK with that, or have some kind of common understanding about using magic items, if you want to play 5e.

 

[UngainlyTitan]

The rules themselves are not doing anything to carry the load of making the game work with that though. If d&d were some kind of asymmetrical wargame like a tabletop version the video game Evolve where only combat matters that might make sense, but d&d needs the noncombat stuff stitching together combat to feel like d&d.

Spoiler: Deconstruction of Evolve's failure

Some of those criticisms map pretty well to GM facing 5e problems too. The big difference is that 5e has a GM tasked with shouldering solutions for them so players don't see the holes or find themselves burdened with the work of filling them.

death has always been a revolving door in d&d with spells like raise dead & such, it didn't need Logan/Wayde Wilson mutant healing factor levels of durability on top of those methods of returning & the portable characters that have been getting discussed by @overgeeked & others over the last page or two.

Edit: It certainly didn't need to free players from any needs for magic items gold & so on from the gm either

I have no idea of what you are trying to say to me here. I think you are misunderstanding what I have been saying completely.