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

[Lanefan]

I don't want to take out the fall on hard times piece. Hard to understand how you took that when in my next paragraph I describe setbacks that are literally falling on hard times. I am reframing the fall on hard times piece from being defined by losing levels and items to story setbacks.

I get this. My comeback, though, is that while mechanical setbacks always matter, story setbacks only matter sometimes; and even then maybe not nearly as much.

Further, a mechanical setback is (with exceedingly rare exceptions) immediately obvious to both player and character as soon as it happens. A story setback might not be obvious at all at the time it happens, in that the players/PCs might not realize how important something is or was until much later if ever. (the game I'm running right now is a perfect example of this - they've hit a staggering setback in the story but don't fully realize it yet)

I stated in an earlier post that if your players only care about levels and treasure then in that case yes, you arguably need level drain (et al) to provide setbacks. However, I don't think that this describes most players. If you have such players, add those features back in. I posted three up thread, so you don't even have to waste time coming up with them.

You did, and they're quite good.

But, what would be the player response were you to try to add them into your own game next weekend? Then, consider the response you'd get had they been present all along and you now decided to take them out.

That's the difference @overgeeked and I are talking about.

 

[tetrasodium]

I think you are over focusing on protagonist as a singular thing. The party as a whole is the protagonist and is it usually done by table agreement. This is really the basis of trad story focused gaming. Of the kind played by the likes of Critical Role. The in-game rules support comes from the tools the game gives the players characters to survive the in-game challenges. From more it points, to resource recovery mechanics.
4e where the characters were, big damn action heroes most supported this kind of play in the D&D space and TSR D&D the least because in the TSR era the characters had to scrounge the needed resources from the presented world in the form of henchmen, magic items, potions and so forth and this resulted in a more operational mode - what @Aldarc refers to as survival horror (Matt Colville agrees him) Though I view survival horror as a more narrower focus, i.e. as something with actual horror genre aspects.
From what I can gather, Colville and @Aldarc would consider running the Red Star Tractor works scenario from ASL as survival horror but I would prefer a different term (even if I am not sure what that term should be) hence my expression of that style as "operational".
If on the other hand, if you enter the campaign with the backstory that one of the characters is the true and rightful heir of Gondor with any kind of reasonable expectation of seeing that happen then you are tending in a more protagonist (or story) mode.
I want to avoid the direct use of story or narrative because in the rpg space those terms have been appropriated by games that mechanically support character development and degrees of authorship by the players of those characters.
In D&D the authorship is in the hands of the DM, but also some casual playstyles where the players expect the characters to "Step up" to combat challenges but the idea of a satisfying narrative is secondary or non-existent also fall (in my view) into the category of protagonist play.

Finally, this is also in my view a table agenda, in the 2e era groups achieved this end by DM force with almost no support from the rules as written.

That bold bit shows why the rules fail at this backported "style" labeling. Characters are so powerful & insulated from needs or risk that they simply don't have any pressure to make or stick to that agreement even if they make it. That was not always the case in past editions. Not only does 5e lack in rules or power levels that encourage the sort of group/party mentality that bold bit covers, 5e even lacks tools the GM could employ to pressure it if a player decides to treat the group as sidekick followers or players start exclusively solo'ing near each other.

That's not a thing that wotc could not take steps to provide some level of GM tools, wotc simply choses not to. Take the discussion on "challenge" going back to 334/334, there are tools present in past editions that are difficult for a GM to use for purposes of adjusting the challenge dial simply because there is nothing they can point at to override a default.

Spoiler: a few examples

• Death at zero/neg10
• A shift from Opportunity attacks to attacks of opportunity
• Return of iterative attack penalties/multi attack penalty
• cleaning up AOE rules
• pre-3.x style -1/+1 at ~6 & 15
• body slots on an official sheet
• Any form of skills revamp to mitigate these problems
• etc

is a mere optional entry in a book like XgE/Tashas/setting/ one of the three spelljammer books/etc or even a UA footnote is all it would take to begin supporting a GM with things to point at when they feel a need to adjust something to apply that pressure. Without a thing written for 5e that a GM can point at pulling mechanics from old editions & other games sans support from wotc runs smack into "It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it". Those attempts crash into that well known idiom because players desire powerful characters & these tools become more important the greater their need in correcting a problem leaving the players feel empowered in dragging their feet & feigning confusion or frustration over any system difference just to resist the unsupported nerf.

 

[Lanefan]

I think you are over focusing on protagonist as a singular thing. The party as a whole is the protagonist and is it usually done by table agreement. This is really the basis of trad story focused gaming. Of the kind played by the likes of Critical Role. The in-game rules support comes from the tools the game gives the players characters to survive the in-game challenges.

The bolded hits the nail bang on the head. Individual characters, while each unique and while each having their own sub-stories, aren't the protagonists* in the sense of the overall story being told/generated as the game goes along.

* - the exception, of course, being solo play where one PC is the party.

 

[Lanefan]

You prefer swingy games. Okay.

I think you're putting the cart before the horse in the rest of your post. The game isn't less swingy so that they can have encounter guidelines. 3e was a wildly swingy game but it had tight encounter guidelines (going even so far as to prescribe wealth by level). The encounter guidelines were simply not always accurately predictive.

Indeed, as has been well-documented here and elsewhere; never mind my own memories of my 3e DM swearing at the rulebooks now and then over just this...

Encounter guidelines do work better in a less swingy game. That said, 5e is moderately swingy. Not as swingy as 3e, but significantly more swingy than 4e (which had the most accurate encounter guidelines out of any edition by a wide margin, IMO).

And the question then becomes, if an encounter's path and outcome can be that closely predicted, is it even worth bothering?

Ultimately, encounter guidelines are just that: guidelines. If you have a brain, you can choose whether to walk the "garden path" as you so put it, or march into the underbrush. If you slavishly follow the guidelines believing that you can't diverge from the beaten path, that's on you my friend.

And in the case of an experienced DM, I agree.

But where does that leave the new DM other than learning by trial and error (which some here seem to strongly dislike as a learning method)?

 

[Lanefan]

I mean, come on. You're telling me that all of you who like "challenge" included level drain in every single adventure? Because I find that very unlikely. Presumably, if you did not, you found some way to challenge the party without constantly resorting to level drain.

Including anything in every adventure gets boring rather quickly. I intentially try to mix up adventure types and focuses - one might be undead, the next might be giants, the next might be a mystery, and so forth - both to keep it fresh and to give a variety of chacracters a chance to do their thing (if they're in the party at the time!).

In the last seven adventures I've run, level drainers featured prominently in one and as a sidelight in another; if memory serves, two levels were lost in total. It's much longer than that since I've had anything appear that had a major aging effect to it. During those seven, one PC did lose two limbs (both his legs at once) through some bad luck; and through an intentional enemy effect another was permanently poly'ed (non-dispellable) into a giant ant - and took a crap-ton of really nice and expensive items with her. There's also been (I think) 6 deaths in total, of which three came within the last real-time month in a back-to-back pair of very tough boss battles where they did well not to lose more.

So, summing up: that's 6 (deaths) + 2 (x levels) + 2 (limb losses) + 1 (perma-poly) major Bad Things over seven adventures. There was also one very major item loss - a Bag of Holding recently destroyed when hit by a lightning bolt; all its contents went with it.

They've also got stinkin' rich over that run, picked up some hella nice items, and have been able to undo all but three of those Bad Things: the Bag-plus-contents remain lost; one dead character who declined revival, and the perma-poly.

Other than brief blips, the party size has been unusually consistent at 6 throughout; with the perma-dead one and the ant replaced on the fly. Level started at 4th for this run, last night the first one got to 7th with the rest mostly 6th.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Including anything in every adventure gets boring rather quickly. I intentially try to mix up adventure types and focuses - one might be undead, the next might be giants, the next might be a mystery, and so forth - both to keep it fresh and to give a variety of chacracters a chance to do their thing (if they're in the party at the time!).

In the last seven adventures I've run, level drainers featured prominently in one and as a sidelight in another; if memory serves, two levels were lost in total. It's much longer than that since I've had anything appear that had a major aging effect to it. During those seven, one PC did lose two limbs (both his legs at once) through some bad luck; and through an intentional enemy effect another was permanently poly'ed (non-dispellable) into a giant ant - and took a crap-ton of really nice and expensive items with her. There's also been (I think) 6 deaths in total, of which three came within the last real-time month in a back-to-back pair of very tough boss battles where they did well not to lose more.

So, summing up: that's 6 (deaths) + 2 (x levels) + 2 (limb losses) + 1 (perma-poly) major Bad Things over seven adventures. There was also one very major item loss - a Bag of Holding recently destroyed when hit by a lightning bolt; all its contents went with it.

They've also got stinkin' rich over that run, picked up some hella nice items, and have been able to undo all but three of those Bad Things: the Bag-plus-contents remain lost; one dead character who declined revival, and the perma-poly.

Other than brief blips, the party size has been unusually consistent at 6 throughout; with the perma-dead one and the ant replaced on the fly. Level started at 4th for this run, last night the first one got to 7th with the rest mostly 6th.

That all sounds amazing!

 

[Aldarc]

It's my experience with almost 40 years of running and playing D&D.

If you don't mind me asking, but if you are that bitter about D&D players not wanting a challenge and wanting easy mode everything, why are you still playing? I personally find it hard to imagine that I would still be playing a game that gave me a misanthropic view of my fellow players.

It's also my experience with nearly a decade of 5E. In my experience, 5E players don't want challenge. They want easy wins and pats on the back. Never mind they're almost guaranteed to win by default.

Your experience has been noted, but you will undoubtedly find people here with comparable amounts of 5e experience who will vehemently disagree with your assessment.

We can't even agree what a "challenge" is, so...you know. That's cool.

I suspect that's because the meaning and nature of "challenges" vary across and within games of D&D, much as it does with other games, sports, and activities.

 

[Malmuria]

I think a game involving high risks like level drain should also offer high rewards. The PCs in my OSE game haven’t run into level drain, but they do have several long term/permanent effects, both positive and negative: eg. cursed armor or boosts to ability scores. Or weird: permanently purple skin for example.

This unbalanced high risk/high reward style is basically a gambling mechanic, and so in that way has been fun. Like gambling, you run the risk of losing everything. But it’s also enjoyable because all these things are ways the setting changes the character, like scars calling back to particular adventures. And vice versa, in that curing a curse is itself an adventure hook

 

[EzekielRaiden]

I agree that there are many other stakes beyond death. But to me, in D&D if death is off the table none of those other stakes mean anything, because you've just destroyed the verisimilitude of the setting and ruined my immersion.

Why? Is your own life meaningless because you aren't at constant risk of death because of smallpox or whatever? Do your achievements lose their significance because you live in an era where most people expect to reach age 70+ where you live?

Further, why do you keep turning this into something WAY more extreme than I've said? I never once said (in this thread) that death should be totally removed. You can go back and check if you like. I have consistently spoken of ADDING stakes other than death. Of making it so at least SOME of the time, death isn't the focus or is even not very relevant. That doesn't mean it can't or shouldn't appear. It just means it isn't the exclusive focus like you and others have advocated.

I just don't understand how being level drained invalidates anything; the campaign to that point all still happened, and then your PC fell into a nest of weights.

And I don't understand why "we lost everyone we loved, so now we live only for revenge" is invalidated by not dying when the Dark Lady destroys your home city.

Now, if all you're saying is you don't like it, that's fine. Just don't play in games where that sort of thing is featured.

Except the problem is, folks like you and others in this thread demand that death be universal, ever present, and often lurking behind literally every single challenge to an extreme degree; if every single combat doesn't have a major risk of permanent, irrevocable, and (generally) random death, it's apparently enough to completely destroy your experience, so therefore everyone has to put up with that.

So what's left then? No challenge at all?

Overgeeked, this is a bad-faith argument, and also deeply insulting to anyone disagreeing with your position. Given you have recently shown frustration with such behavior, it is in turn frustrating to see you say this. I would like to respond to any actually serious and respectful argument in this direction you might have, but I would need to know what that argument is first, because right now all I'm seeing is a naked insult.

Think about it like a toolbox. Which is a better toolbox: the toolbox with one tool in it or the toolbox with dozens of tools in it.

The latter. Which is why it's so frustrating that the people who advocate for death to be constant, ever present, random, permanent, and irrevocable act like their toolbox is the one with dozens of tools in it. It isn't. It has one tool, a blunt hammer. Suggesting that we add any other tools to the box gets instant accusations you might be familiar with

Like, "So what's left? No challenge at all?"

It's my experience with almost 40 years of running and playing D&D. It's also my experience with nearly a decade of 5E. In my experience, 5E players don't want challenge. They want easy wins and pats on the back. Never mind they're almost guaranteed to win by default.

This is, again, openly insulting. I find it difficult to engage with your point when you are explicitly mocking me and others who don't share your perspective.

We can't even agree what a "challenge" is, so...you know. That's cool.

Well, it would help if people who prefer ever present character death allowed for the possibility of real, serious, meaningful challenges that don't involve death.

How can trying to win be hostile to any game's premise, first off; and if the DM gets upset by the players advocating for themselves/their characters then that's someone who IMO shouldn't be DMing.

Because it is a social activity. This should be obvious.

If the DM doesn't ban a species and a player decides to play one, the DM is stuck with that and it's his own fault: he didn't get on top of it ahead of time.

Then why are you assuming the DM has not discussed the tone, theme, and overall style of play in advance as well? It is of vital importance that you tell your players the kind of game you're interested in running.

I think the participants would beg to disagree here.

They may disagree all they like. It is a performance, not a sport. No more than Cirque du Soleil is a sport (despite being performance gymnastics, and gymnastics is a sport.)

When I said "everything is predetermined" I was referring to WWE. That said, one could argue that in editions/systems with very low swinginess and tight math, the GM can set up a combat and have a very very good idea how it's going to go, even to the point of knowing how many rounds it will last. To me, that's both pre-determined and, frankly, kinda boring.

Then you are using the word "pre-determined" to mean things that aren't actually determined in advance, which I find frustrating and difficult to respond to. If the word can be extended to include things that aren't actually determined in advance, but simply have a likelihood of ending up in an expected way, then the only things that could possibly be "fun" to you are ones where it's totally impossible to know what would happen in advance, at which point we would have deleted the rules entirely and left everything up to a bloody coin flip.

Unless, of course, what you really mean is that you like having a good idea but not a perfect one...which no system, not even 4e, has ever offered. Which makes it difficult to see what point you're making, when either all systems or no systems actually meet the standard you've set.

These two statements are at odds: 1) For something to be challenging there has to be a risk of failure, and; 2) Winning is fun, losing is not.

Firstly, your second statement is flawed. It should be, "Winning is fun, punishment is not." Failure does not need to mean punishment, hence why people talk about "challenging" vs "punitive." Secondly, there are other forms of failure than character death, and they can be more impactful than character death. Failure does not need to be punitive to still sting, and death does not need to be the only form of failure that ultimately matters. There are some things more valuable than the question of survival.

If you can't lose, there's no challenge.

Death is not the only form of losing, and (PC) death is often less interesting than other forms of loss. "Greater than the death of flesh is the death of hope, the death of dreams. Against this peril we can never surrender." The Book of G'Quan, Babylon 5.

If you lose, it's no fun.

If you are punished, it's no fun. Punishment is one form of loss. There are others.

So you have to always win for it to be fun...which means there's no challenge.

You have to never be punished for it to be fun. That is perfectly doable while still offering challenge. Humans do it every single day.

If there's no risk of losing, winning is meaningless.

Sure. But if you break the two implicit assumptions here, namely "loss must result in punishment" and "the only loss with any meaning is character death," a whole world of additional possibilities arises.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Why? Is your own life meaningless because you aren't at constant risk of death because of smallpox or whatever? Do your achievements lose their significance because you live in an era where most people expect to reach age 70+ where you live?

Further, why do you keep turning this into something WAY more extreme than I've said? I never once said (in this thread) that death should be totally removed. You can go back and check if you like. I have consistently spoken of ADDING stakes other than death. Of making it so at least SOME of the time, death isn't the focus or is even not very relevant. That doesn't mean it can't or shouldn't appear. It just means it isn't the exclusive focus like you and others have advocated.


And I don't understand why "we lost everyone we loved, so now we live only for revenge" is invalidated by not dying when the Dark Lady destroys your home city.


Except the problem is, folks like you and others in this thread demand that death be universal, ever present, and often lurking behind literally every single challenge to an extreme degree; if every single combat doesn't have a major risk of permanent, irrevocable, and (generally) random death, it's apparently enough to completely destroy your experience, so therefore everyone has to put up with that.


Overgeeked, this is a bad-faith argument, and also deeply insulting to anyone disagreeing with your position. Given you have recently shown frustration with such behavior, it is in turn frustrating to see you say this. I would like to respond to any actually serious and respectful argument in this direction you might have, but I would need to know what that argument is first, because right now all I'm seeing is a naked insult.


The latter. Which is why it's so frustrating that the people who advocate for death to be constant, ever present, random, permanent, and irrevocable act like their toolbox is the one with dozens of tools in it. It isn't. It has one tool, a blunt hammer. Suggesting that we add any other tools to the box gets instant accusations you might be familiar with

Like, "So what's left? No challenge at all?"


This is, again, openly insulting. I find it difficult to engage with your point when you are explicitly mocking me and others who don't share your perspective.


Well, it would help if people who prefer ever present character death allowed for the possibility of real, serious, meaningful challenges that don't involve death.


Because it is a social activity. This should be obvious.


Then why are you assuming the DM has not discussed the tone, theme, and overall style of play in advance as well? It is of vital importance that you tell your players the kind of game you're interested in running.


They may disagree all they like. It is a performance, not a sport. No more than Cirque du Soleil is a sport (despite being performance gymnastics, and gymnastics is a sport.)


Then you are using the word "pre-determined" to mean things that aren't actually determined in advance, which I find frustrating and difficult to respond to. If the word can be extended to include things that aren't actually determined in advance, but simply have a likelihood of ending up in an expected way, then the only things that could possibly be "fun" to you are ones where it's totally impossible to know what would happen in advance, at which point we would have deleted the rules entirely and left everything up to a bloody coin flip.

Unless, of course, what you really mean is that you like having a good idea but not a perfect one...which no system, not even 4e, has ever offered. Which makes it difficult to see what point you're making, when either all systems or no systems actually meet the standard you've set.


Firstly, your second statement is flawed. It should be, "Winning is fun, punishment is not." Failure does not need to mean punishment, hence why people talk about "challenging" vs "punitive." Secondly, there are other forms of failure than character death, and they can be more impactful than character death. Failure does not need to be punitive to still sting, and death does not need to be the only form of failure that ultimately matters. There are some things more valuable than the question of survival.


Death is not the only form of losing, and (PC) death is often less interesting than other forms of loss. "Greater than the death of flesh is the death of hope, the death of dreams. Against this peril we can never surrender." The Book of G'Quan, Babylon 5.


If you are punished, it's no fun. Punishment is one form of loss. There are others.


You have to never be punished for it to be fun. That is perfectly doable while still offering challenge. Humans do it every single day.


Sure. But if you break the two implicit assumptions here, namely "loss must result in punishment" and "the only loss with any meaning is character death," a whole world of additional possibilities arises.

You have said, in other threads I believe, that you play D&D in which death is off the table, at least sometimes. Where the hammer isn't in the toolbox, so to speak. I know who I'm talking to on this site, pretty much, and I assume you know me on this site.

I don't want to play that way. I'm not against there being other tools, there absolutely should be other tools. I just don't want to play a game of D&D where the hammer isn't in the box, because I feel the other tools lose their usefulness unless the hammer is there. I have  never, in any thread I can recollect, said that the hammer was the exclusive focus, just that in D&D I need it in the box.