D&D 5E The Gloves Are Off?

[iserith]

Yes, because in this case a little table disharmony now can prevent much more of it later.

That view strikes me as being fundamentally untrusting of one's players. It seems to be simpler to only play with people you trust.

 

[iserith]

Sure, but that doesn't change the reason the GM caved to the player in the first place in this proposed scenario. There's still that desire to maintain peace.

And the DM is welcome to maintain that desire as long as it's prudent. If they are a very agreeable person, that might cause them to build up resentment until a straw breaks the camel's back. If they are more disagreeable, the second time it comes up might result in a hard "No." Each person will have to figure that out for themselves.

 

[Vaalingrade]

Or it's an issue of the player assuming something instead of thinking to bring it up.

How much are they expected to 'bring up' at this point though. Especially if it's a new player who might not be expecting contact poison to be a thing. I go pretty hard on my character descriptions, but I usually don't explain every detail. Like I've never described my socks and the only time I've described a scarf is because I had Iron Scarf as a spell.

While I personally think that more expansive and detailed lists are a better thing,

For truth. Give me an equipment list that's a good 250 pages.

I don't think the player is without blame here, even if the mistake was both innocent and understandable. I've had players who were very forthright in determining what their character had/looked like (sometimes to the point of commissioning custom minis or drawing their own pictures of them), so there's room for saying this is more than just a "system issue" (which would seem to indict a lot of rules-light games).

I feel this runs into the issue with what @TheSword was talking about. What if you run into someone with no visual creative talent or eye for detail who doesn't describe thier shoe laces, but then wants to use their shoe laces as a garrote?

Huh, that's a point in 3E's favor, then.

The other is the AEG. I cannot and will not talk it up enough. It si more essential than the MM and the DMG only beats it by having such player material as magic items and PRCs in.

I disagree. Leaving aside your paraphrasing (which doesn't seem entirely accurate), the idea of using the dice as a determinative is that the roll tells you what happened, and whatever description you come up with interprets that from an in-game standpoint. Given that the dice have already been rolled, trying to intercept the description doesn't change the mechanics, and so doesn't alter the course of events.

For me, it's like having an ingestion poison in a jar on a shelf and asking for a saving throw not to knock it back like a jello shot. IF the save dictate the trigger for the save, that's pretty suspect.

 

[Lanefan]

Or it's an issue of the player assuming something instead of thinking to bring it up. While I personally think that more expansive and detailed lists are a better thing, I don't think the player is without blame here, even if the mistake was both innocent and understandable.

I'm not suggesting the system take all the blame here, just that its underlying contribution to the problem cannot and should not be ignored.

The DM takes some blame for not catching the error (though were the DM new to it I'd cut a huge amount of slack here), and both DM and player take some blame for not getting these details sorted before sending the PC into the field.

 

[Vaalingrade]

Thats interacting to me. I know im a total jerk. Im totally ok with it too.

It's still just the immediate touch though, right? There's no time for the character to do anything else but lay hand to no-no juice.

 

[Celebrim]

With respect, I think this is a profound misunderstanding of the role of the DM.

With respect, I'm past considering you an authority on the role of the DM or what constitutes good DMing.

The mistake here is to treat D&D as a game suitable for "tournaments".

It is not.

Considering how long tournament D&D has been around and how applicable is to the history of the game, and further how applicable the standards of tournament D&D are to many of the different varieties of D&D that are actually played, I can only treat this statement as a bit of an aberrant opinion and not as a statement of fact. Nor even for that matter a useful statement. It's not like anyone is unaware how different it is to get uniform rulings from a large population of DMs or that competitive D&D doesn't have the same rigor as say competitive chess.

Another issue here, is neurodivergence...

And now we are lecturing me about what challenges neurodivergent people have which is ridiculous on two fronts, one of which is it is me you are talking to, and the other is you probably shouldn't approach this topic from the standpoint of belittling people with my low expectations for what they can deal with. We're not "cripples" or something.

And that's to not even get to that so much of the post I'm not quoting comes down to just addition waring and making claims about what 5e is or isn't supposed to be like that amount to your opinion and which are not I think sustainable by quoting the authors.

And that's not even getting into the fact that "the trouble is" you aren't actually looking at the totality of what I've said or been saying. Or really, anything I've been saying for that matter. Please tell me again how skilled you are at calming people?

 

[Lanefan]

That view strikes me as being fundamentally untrusting of one's players. It seems to be simpler to only play with people you trust.

I trust my players to generally act in their own best interests, just as I would.

And if I can prevent ten arguments later by having one argument now, that seems well worth it.

 

[Vaalingrade]

I'm not suggesting the system take all the blame here, just that its underlying contribution to the problem cannot and should not be ignored.

The DM takes some blame for not catching the error (though were the DM new to it I'd cut a huge amount of slack here), and both DM and player take some blame for not getting these details sorted before sending the PC into the field.

The error here being using contact poison at all.

 

[Vaalingrade]

With respect, I'm past considering you an authority on the role of the DM or what constitutes good DMing.

I dunno, man, you cited Gygax, so that might not be the sick burn you're intending.

 

[Voadam]

Maybe, but it's a pretty traditional approach to narrating saving throws versus poison, with justification going all the way back to Gygax.

Eh, a 1e poison save from a needle trap can be to narratively say whether it scratched you or not, but if you are not positioned in the right place I do not expect a save to be called for at all. A lot of 1e Gygaxian poison examples are also mechanically set up so that hit/miss narrative does not apply so well. A monster needs to hit and do damage before there needs to be a save versus the monster's venom. The save is not to see narratively whether the snake bit you or not, the attack roll is and armor helps there. A dagger of venom must hit first then save separately after hitting. Poison gas generally triggers a save only if you are in the cloud radius. Narratively it might be you jump away quick enough, but if you were not in the radius to begin with my experience is a DM won't generally call for a save to determine your position. Poison potions must be actively drunk and ingestive poison must be eaten before a save is called for. 1e Dwarven saving throw bonus against poison is narratively being physically resistant to toxins, not being extra lucky and dodgy.