D&D General Creativity?

[Lanefan]

I don't really agree. The 1E DMG may say that, and you can exclude it if you like, but the 2E DMG does not.

And lets' not forget the intent of why that bit is in the 1e DMG: it's not there to stifle creativity per se, but to remind the DM to push back against players exploiting holes in the rules to undue advantage...which in a way means that in a very un-Gygaxian way Gygax was tacitly admitting his rules weren't perfect.

At least that's how I read it, anyway.

Re: plot elements, I think that's a red herring in the context of creativity, because that's just saying "Either it's a narrative game, or it's not creative", which to me seems confused. If the DM doesn't let the plot change by player activity that's a problem, but the sandbox is an ancient tradition and the railroad is a later one.

Indeed.

I don't think technically "asking" the DM makes the player creativity less, either. I'm not sure what your logic is there.

There are some to whom any sniff of having to "ask the DM" is anathema. I don't understand this line of thought myself - in the end the DM is the final arbiter of what's impossible-possible-probable-certain in the setting, so why not ask first - but it's out there.

We have to assume a reasonably cooperative DM.

Yes, or at the very least a consistent DM.

This is on the D&D forum, not the other RPGs forum, so ruling out all forms of D&D just seems a bit silly. I agree that other systems are better for this - Dungeon World is an obvious one, but I don't see 2E or 4E having a big problem here. Indeed one of the major reasons my group liked 4E so much was that it reminded them of 2E because they could say what crazy thing they wanted to do and then we could work it out. Whereas 3E if you worked it out, there was a rule for everything, and the end result was typically you had to make 3+ checks (often with severe penalties) to gain exactly ZERO benefit (or a very small one) apart from looking cool, whereas in 2E/4E one check, occasionally two sufficed, and usually let you do something you couldn't otherwise do within the rules, and 4E's table was particularly good.

I've found 1e to be more than flexible enough - a player says what a character is trying to do and if there's a rule that handles it then the rule applies, and if there isn't a rule then I quickly determine where the proposed action falls on the impossible <--> certain spectrum and if necessary get the player to roll a die.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

Yes, or at the very least a consistent DM.

You say this as though consistency is easier than cooperation. This is demonstrably untrue in essentially all cases. Humans are really, really bad at consistency--especially when it comes to abstract things rather than concrete ones. Humans overall are actually quite good at cooperation, especially in leisure activities.

 

[Lanefan]

You say this as though consistency is easier than cooperation.

Whether it's easier or not is immaterial. Consistency in a DM is important; even if a DM is consistently un-cooperative at least the players know what to expect and can work with it, while an inconsistent yet cooperative DM will inevitably end up providing a poorer overall experience than would a consistent one who has the same degree of cooperation. The players need to be able to rely on the DM providing a somewhat similar game experience this week as she did last week and will again next week, and within that play experience be able to rely on consistent and fair rulings and use of rules in the run of play.

This is demonstrably untrue in essentially all cases. Humans are really, really bad at consistency--especially when it comes to abstract things rather than concrete ones.

If relying only on memory, perhaps. That's what written records and pictures are for; to make the abstract concrete.

Humans overall are actually quite good at cooperation, especially in leisure activities.

Maaaaay-be?

 

[EzekielRaiden]

Whether it's easier or not is immaterial.

Uh, not at all--when one is presenting one thing as a fallback baseline and another thing as a loftier goal to pursue, the fallback baseline better be actually more achievable than the loftier goal, or the whole argument falls apart.

Consistency in a DM is important;

It is! And that's why humans being so bad at it is such a problem.

while an inconsistent yet cooperative DM will inevitably end up providing a poorer overall experience than would a consistent one who has the same degree of cooperation.

You're straight-up comparing apples and oranges though. You're comparing "inconsistent but cooperative" against "consistent and cooperative." Of course having two good things is better than having just one! The actual relevant comparison here is "inconsistent but cooperative" and "consistent but uncooperative." And yes, I will absolutely take inconsistent but cooperative over consistent but uncooperative basically any day of the week when it comes to DMs. The former is a friendly human. The latter is a jerk human.

The players need to be able to rely on the DM providing a somewhat similar game experience this week as she did last week and will again next week, and within that play experience be able to rely on consistent and fair rulings and use of rules in the run of play.

In other words...the rules cannot actually just be suggestions. They have to be actually quite robust--and ignoring them has to be a really well-motivated, justified, important deviation.

Which is what I've said pretty much forever, and yet people constantly push back against it.

If relying only on memory, perhaps. That's what written records and pictures are for; to make the abstract concrete.

And yet how many DMs do in fact only rely on memory? How many DMs failed to actually play AD&D because their memory simply didn't retain the rules written in the book?

People talk a great game about "invisible rulebooks." How is that compatible with "written records and pictures"? And how about the many, many things we never write down for one reason or another? Those things are almost always super important, especially from someone claiming that the rules are suggestions (not that you did, at least not in this conversation, but the topic has been broached.)

Maaaaay-be?

Do you deny that humans are social creatures who suffer mental health issues when they attempt to avoid socializing? Do you deny that, for example, sports leagues exist, where a very large number of people agree to do some very unnatural things?

It isn't perfect by any means. But we do quite a bit better at cooperating, across a wide variety of leisure activities, than we do at being consistent especially when it comes to mathematics, probability, logic, and adjudication.

 

[Lanefan]

Uh, not at all--when one is presenting one thing as a fallback baseline and another thing as a loftier goal to pursue, the fallback baseline better be actually more achievable than the loftier goal, or the whole argument falls apart.

It is! And that's why humans being so bad at it is such a problem.

You're straight-up comparing apples and oranges though. You're comparing "inconsistent but cooperative" against "consistent and cooperative." Of course having two good things is better than having just one! The actual relevant comparison here is "inconsistent but cooperative" and "consistent but uncooperative." And yes, I will absolutely take inconsistent but cooperative over consistent but uncooperative basically any day of the week when it comes to DMs. The former is a friendly human. The latter is a jerk human.

And the latter is probably, in the long run, a better DM. Sure, if the un-cooperativeness gets to be too much the players will leave; but absent that extreme the consistent DM - even if un-cooperative when it comes to player creativity - will have far more success at keeping a table going over the long haul than will one who is inconsistent.

In other words...the rules cannot actually just be suggestions. They have to be actually quite robust--and ignoring them has to be a really well-motivated, justified, important deviation.

Or the rules can be suggestions, and the DM just has to be consistent in how-when-if those suggestions are followed.

And yet how many DMs do in fact only rely on memory? How many DMs failed to actually play AD&D because their memory simply didn't retain the rules written in the book?

No idea. Better question, though, is how many DMs ran a good game anyway simply by being consistent with what rules they did remember plus those they knowingly or unknowingly changed?

People talk a great game about "invisible rulebooks." How is that compatible with "written records and pictures"? And how about the many, many things we never write down for one reason or another? Those things are almost always super important, especially from someone claiming that the rules are suggestions (not that you did, at least not in this conversation, but the topic has been broached.)

We're talking about player creativity, right, in use of spells and-or abilities? Thus, we're already pretty much outside what the rules are/were designed to cover before the discussion even starts. And therefore, we have to look at both DM cooperation (does the DM at least give this oddball idea a chance) and consistency (when the same situation arises again will the DM handle it the same way). Obviously, having both is best; but if there must be only one it had better be consistency.

It isn't perfect by any means. But we do quite a bit better at cooperating, across a wide variety of leisure activities, than we do at being consistent especially when it comes to mathematics, probability, logic, and adjudication.

Here the question is more one of consistency in one's imagination.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

Agreed! It is. But (as I said elsewhere!), while the proto ability check system of B/X isn't a "stunting system" in the formal sense (like 4e or Cortex+), in the informal sense, a system that has a fairly well unified action resolution engine with bounded possible results and genre expectations makes for relative (with D&D hardship as the standard!) ease-of-use! B/X has served me 2nd best for stunting in D&D land (low bar!) with 4e out in front of the heap by a country mile!

Well, its relatively easy to introduce an ability check system into classic D&D generally (I don't see that B/X is particularly gifted here). 'd20, roll under', or something closer to the type of systems 3e/4e/5e use have all been implemented, along with various other flavors. Outside of 4e though I don't know of a system which even HINTS at the idea that the player should declare an intent, and the GM should abide by it if the dice fall in the 'success' range. That, or some sort of 'say yes or roll' etc. would seem to be necessary before you get much of anywhere. I didn't play a LOT of B/X specifically, but we had it and understood it. It was a very clear and concise system in terms of what it did cover, which was nice, but definitely means it is a very focused genre-specific game.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

I don't really agree. The 1E DMG may say that, and you can exclude it if you like, but the 2E DMG does not.

And the lack of rules means that in general this stuff can be interpreted pretty broadly - for example, in combat, doing basically anything which "isn't in the rules" with an attack is just an attack at -4. It is definitely subject to the DM, but in reality that's true for virtually all games, including very modern ones, except where the DM is eliminated entirely (including 4E, where the DM could just refuse to use page 42, or use it extremely ungenerously). To my mind in 2E at least, you were pretty much encouraged to interpret spells creatively, and we absolutely did.

But the GM is still absolutely sovereign over which combat maneuvers are even possible. There is also this sort of subtle supposition here that 'progress towards victory' is a thing and that any action which is likely to make that happen faster than, say, swinging your sword, should be penalized as some sort of compensation. The usual rhetoric being something about "why, the players will just always declare that action" followed by some statement about how 'unrealistic' that would be. This represents a specific mental construct within which thinking about the game in a 'D&D-like way' is bounded. Its VERY VERY restrictive. There may be fewer rules, per se, but the restrictiveness of the PROCESS OF PLAY is very high!

I disagree about 'very modern ones', games like PbtA and FitD based systems don't do this AT ALL, nor do most BW based games AFAIK. In fact a game like Dungeon World absolutely doesn't allow the GM to outright deny a player the opportunity to make a move. They may indicate that the fictional position is not favorable, say by way of stating that such a move would open up a 'golden opportunity' for a GM hard move to come first, or that some additional fictional position might be needed (the famous "you cannot just hack the dragon with your sword" example). That does imply SOME responsibility for the GM to make fictional position mean SOMETHING, but its very different from how ANY version of D&D has ever done it, with 4e being a POSSIBLE exception (the way I play 4e for instance, but it is not the only way to approach its rules).

Re: plot elements, I think that's a red herring in the context of creativity, because that's just saying "Either it's a narrative game, or it's not creative", which to me seems confused. If the DM doesn't let the plot change by player activity that's a problem, but the sandbox is an ancient tradition and the railroad is a later one.

No, there's a lot of different forms which creativity can take. There are more options than 'sandbox or railroad' in the world though.

I don't think technically "asking" the DM makes the player creativity less, either. I'm not sure what your logic is there. We have to assume a reasonably cooperative DM. This is on the D&D forum, not the other RPGs forum, so ruling out all forms of D&D just seems a bit silly. I agree that other systems are better for this - Dungeon World is an obvious one, but I don't see 2E or 4E having a big problem here. Indeed one of the major reasons my group liked 4E so much was that it reminded them of 2E because they could say what crazy thing they wanted to do and then we could work it out. Whereas 3E if you worked it out, there was a rule for everything, and the end result was typically you had to make 3+ checks (often with severe penalties) to gain exactly ZERO benefit (or a very small one) apart from looking cool, whereas in 2E/4E one check, occasionally two sufficed, and usually let you do something you couldn't otherwise do within the rules, and 4E's table was particularly good.

Well, yes, a GM can essentially alter the process of play in, say, 5e, and hew closer to a 'story game' kind of play. That is not how the game is intended to play though! 4e is distinct in all of D&D, IMHO, in actively encouraging this kind of almost PbtA-like play and removing the barriers to it, at least potentially. 2e, not really. I think it is pretty close to identical to 5e. Yes, both 2e and 5e have player creativity in terms of reacting within DM-prescribed limits to DM-supplied situations/challenges/fiction, but I find that a much narrower design space than many people here do.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

I disagree about 'very modern ones', games like PbtA and FitD based systems don't do this AT ALL, nor do most BW based games AFAIK. In fact a game like Dungeon World absolutely doesn't allow the GM to outright deny a player the opportunity to make a move. They may indicate that the fictional position is not favorable, say by way of stating that such a move would open up a 'golden opportunity' for a GM hard move to come first, or that some additional fictional position might be needed (the famous "you cannot just hack the dragon with your sword" example). That does imply SOME responsibility for the GM to make fictional position mean SOMETHING, but its very different from how ANY version of D&D has ever done it, with 4e being a POSSIBLE exception (the way I play 4e for instance, but it is not the only way to approach its rules).

I don't think it is "very different", and I feel like your argument here is extremely wobbly. I think you can reasonably talk about the process being different but the actual result is extremely similar with the same person DMing both games.

There's a lot of all-caps words in there, but not a lot of logic.

No, there's a lot of different forms which creativity can take. There are more options than 'sandbox or railroad' in the world though.

You're not addressing my point.

2e, not really. I think it is pretty close to identical to 5e. Yes, both 2e and 5e have player creativity in terms of reacting within DM-prescribed limits to DM-supplied situations/challenges/fiction, but I find that a much narrower design space than many people here do.

Yeah, you do. But I think that indicates a serious failure of comprehension or even active unwillingness to comprehend on your part, rather than proof that your very lightly sketched claims hold much water. For example, you see the "DM-prescribed limits" as some sort of pre-existing thing made of adamantium, rather than something that barely exists, and when it does exist, is highly malleable.

I'd say 5E and 2E have a pretty sizeable difference myself.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

I'm sure there are other, more shall we say cooperative games out there. But letting the player do whatever they want falls apart pretty quickly and can easily ruin the fun for everyone else at the table if there are no checks and balances. If you don't have some structure, it quickly becomes story time, with the person who wants to aggrandize their PC the most becoming super powerful.

You know we have been around this bush an infinite number of times, so you know my reply, which is that the notion that players are just mindless self-aggrandizing actors who's only concern is amassing giant loot/xp piles is an EXTREMELY limited position. In fact I would say it is just plain an extreme position! There's certainly a need for a Process of Play in order to lend the activity the character of a game. It need not be anything like the one D&D chooses! Thus I don't find this point convincing at all. In fact I play in games all the time which, according to this rubric are not possible!

Games need some sort of structure, something to balance things out. Some people would be okay with do whatever you want, others would create PCs that could make tornadoes like The Flash just by running super fast or have a PC that causes everyone in the room to quake with fear when they enter "just because". Others would be half dragon, half vampire with the benefits of both but no penalties. A player would take the noble background to mean that they had 2 henchmen that they ran that also had class levels that all went at the same time, basically tripling their capabilities. Some would just push rules so that their PC dominated the entire battlefield every combat while never being threatened themselves.

First of all, every RPG (I guess someone could invent an exception to this) has a genre, and thus genre conventions, and has fictional position, which the participants acknowledge dictates what sorts of statements about what characters do are legal and which are not. The decisions as to what falls in and out of bounds can successfully be decided by MANY different possible mechanisms. Games, in my direct and extensive experience, do not fall apart merely because players may be making some of those declarations. Nor should we neglect the Czege Principle, which we have discussed many times before (whomever is challenged by a situation should not be the one adjudicating when and how it is resolved). Thus I find all these 'bugbears' you quote above to be little more than fairy tales certain GMs seem to tell their players to justify a certain type of game play.

How do I know this? Because I've seen it or had players suggest it. I'm all for creativity. But while D&D is a game of make believe, it starts to fall apart if you color too far outside the lines. Maybe only a small percentage of players do this, but left unchecked they can harm the fun of everyone else at the table, not just the DM but the other players as well. If you want a gonzo anything goes game, that's cool. I don't see the point and at a certain point I think it would be incredibly boring. I think there has to be guidelines, if not hard and fast rules, to limit some players from just pulling out that "I win" button every time.

Nonsense. I mean, yes, if you set up a classic dungeon crawl and then have the players take over the GM's role as arbiter of the environment and actions, then that game process will go wonky. Not really because the players CANNOT be trusted to handle adjudications, but simply because Czege won't be satisfied and the games built-in incentives will act in a perverse way. However its perfectly possible to run a dungeon crawl in Dungeon World, in fact it is basically meant for EXACTLY THAT, yet the GM has very constrained options and authority in Dungeon World, and players can most certainly assert what it is that their characters CAN do, for example, as well as making declarations which impose constraints on the fiction the GM is able to put on the table (IE by searching for a secret door in some location and finding it, for example). Now, the GM might be perfectly within her rights to then constrain the utility of said door, making it locked, leading into a very narrow passage, etc. but only in concert with the rules on making GM moves.

As we have many times discussed, all this works perfectly well, and the notion that there has to be some sort of GM who 'rides herd on the players' is merely a reflection of the specific way you trad/neo trad people play! It certainly isn't a design constraint on RPGs, at all!

 

[bloodtide]

When playing 5E I've had to bend over backwards to encourage it. I've had to beg players to try anything that wasn't specifically listed on their character sheet and literally bribe them (in game) to get them to try anything remotely resembling creative shenanigans. Skill check to do something awesome? Nope, chance of failure...won't do it. Just narrate the cool thing with no mechanical up or downside? Nope, no mechanical benefit and it wastes time at the table. Automatically grant advantage for anything even remotely resembling creative shenanigans? Nope, too arbitrary and not explicitly covered by the rules. Ugh.

I found this often too. Even more for younger gamers.

If the player cannot alter the game at will, the DM cannot alter the game at will either. This is the fundamental agreement behind playing a written game as opposed to Calvinball.

I don't agree.

It is the player's game, they can decide things work any way they please.

Geee, If I had a player say something like this to me, I would just kick them out. If it's "your game" you don't need me to be DM, do you?

The real problem with classic D&D (and I will include 3.x and 5e here as they aren't meaningfully distinct) is that the core paradigm is to put all the plot elements completely in the hands of the GM, with virtually no exceptions. This means any player creativity is basically always going to be asking to get something from the GM.

I guess here you are talking about Storytelling games where each person can do things like "create plot point" or "alter plot reality".

One thing that irks me as both player and (newly starting) GM is when players clearly don't know the rules and fish for things they can get away with, often on the outer bounds of plausibility. And when their first fishing attempt fails, and they try another, and another...it bogs down the whole game, for everybody. And if I try to put in a time or attempt limit, that's going to breed ill will too, especially as I'm alternating with a GM who's pretty relaxed about that.

I agree this bogs down a game when players do this. It's why I'm a Hard Fun type DM. In general "Trying Something" will have a cost, and most often will have a cost for failure. Also one of my basic House Rules is that during a game a player my never ask IF they CAN do something or IF something will WORK: this is a "your character takes no actions this round and stands their confused".

In other words...the rules cannot actually just be suggestions. They have to be actually quite robust--and ignoring them has to be a really well-motivated, justified, importantdeviation.

Which is what I've said pretty much forever, and yet people constantly push back against it.

Well, I will always see the rules as suggestions.