Not a Conspiracy Theory: Moving Toward Better Criticism in RPGs

[AbdulAlhazred]

I think at an even more "root" level the one thing I'd want to keep as a guiding principle is the ability to get down to a very high granularity of task/conflict resolution - i.e. resolve things step by step rather than all in one go, even if it takes longer at the table. This is where I fall off the 4e skill-challenge wagon, for example.

Enforcing speed/efficiency of story advancement isn't even on my list of priorities; it'll advance as fast or as slowly as the players and GM want it to and if it's slow then so be it. There's always another session.

The rules kind of have to pay a lot of attention to combat as that's the one thing that pretty much has to be done entirely in the abstract. That said, round-by-round ablative combat has pros and cons to it, no question there; perhaps the biggest pro being that IME players just love-love-love! rolling dice and combat gives lots of reasons to do so.

That's just it for me though. I've played these games for almost 50 years, I want to MOVE ON. It stopped being that interesting to mill around for years as some low level D&D PC because every blasted door has to be diddled with. I mean, nothing is wrong with digging down into the details of things where it is interesting and significant, but I could care less about buying a new box of iron rations and being told to track how much my PC eats. UGH!

So, I really need a system that can handle zooming out, resolving certain things at lower levels of detail, or just moving on to the parts where the more significant choices are going to come into play. 4e allowed a version of that, which I liked because you could certainly dig down to whatever level you wanted. Games like BitD tend to be arranged in such a way that this kind of 'just happens', though you CAN subvert things or change the default focus when you want. Like in our last session Takeo and Beaker spent the whole session info gathering, and actually got into what is almost a 'score within a score', lol. So, you really can zoom way in, we could have, in theory, handled this with a single die roll, BitD certainly would have let us do that.

 

[kenada]

I'd advise following constraints such as have been outlined by other posters up-thread. What does your fiction say? What does the game state say (and accompanying rules)? What's going on (has momentum)? What is your agenda (having adopted principles such as making PC's lives interesting)?

An example given in the DMG is the Queen throwing the PCs in the dungeon for their impudence, so your example (that I bolded) is in scope. A complication could very well be being declared outlaws... but not if that doesn't flow from where you are and what has gone before.

In short, the adventure should not be zagged when your principles / constraints call for a zig... but that doesn't mean you can't make that zig a hard consequence.

I’d like to explore the example a bit more. Let’s assume that the DM has indicated that this is a possible consequence. When the PCs go to fight the Ruffians, the DM notes this will have fallout if they kill someone, especially with the Townmaster who is afraid of retribution. This is known because the PCs can see how the townsfolk are afraid, and they’ve talked to a few people who mention the Townmaster in particular is trying to keep things together but feels like he can’t do much about the situation. So the PCs decide to enact justice in the way that they tend to do: they kill all that bad guys. The townspeople are happy that someone has come to kick Ruffian butt, but the Townmaster is freaked out.

From there, the DM explains what is happening and what consequence the Townmaster is considering: declaring them outlaws. He needs to show that he is a friend to the Ruffians to prevent them from hurting people in the town. The PCs try to negotiate. Maybe they suggest they can take care of the problem, but the Townmaster is wary. They roll because there are obviously consequences at stake, and …. Well, it’ll depend and could go one of the ways described in the previous post.

Success with a hindrance is the Townmaster has to make a show of things to the Ruffians. He agrees it would be helpful to deal with the Ruffian problem, and they’d appreciate it, but he can’t be seen showing any kind of support. Even though they’re themselves considered outlaws, the Ruffians have demonstrated that they will use violence to impose their will. However, the Townmaster slips the PCs a token to show to trusted people to gain their support.

Otherwise, on a failure, the PCs are properly declared outlaws. They could try to act like the Ruffians and get what they want by imposition, but they’re pretty much on their own when it comes to dealing with the Ruffians. No one is going to help them, and if they are on the losing side of things, then it sucks to be the PCs. Even if the PCs somehow prevail, they will probably need to do something to make restitution and show the Townmaster and people of Phandalin that they’re not a threat to it.

When I talk about this situation as a “zag”, it’s in the context of the adventure which (more or less) assumes the PCs heroically save the town from the Ruffians. Maybe the party kills them all, or they detail and take the members of the gang prisoner, but the rest of the adventure is set up to dispense the necessary hooks to get the PCs to go to the other places of interest (Thundertree, Cragmaw Castle, etc). With the zag, those hooks are gone. No one is going to talk to the PCs (definitely not openly). The PCs might still discover those things, but it’s going to be through other mechanisms. Perhaps they set out north from Phandalin and run into some of those situations naturally instead of via hook.

What I’m trying to suss out is to what extent having an adventure like that acts as a constraint, or how compatible this kind of play is compatible with having an adventure like that at all. Even if this consequence makes sense (it follows from the fiction, makes sense, is signaled as a consequence, etc), should one still keep the intended arrow of play in mind? Maybe instead of being declared outlaws, a more zig-aligned approach would be putting the PCs in the service of the Townmaster or requiring them to make an act of contrition towards the Ruffians as a way to diffuse the situation and avoid reprisals?

 

[Thomas Shey]

I guess the point I'm trying to make is that while some trad-only gamers may never have tried different flavours, almost everyone who plays non-trad would have got their start with D&D or similar (and may well still play them in addition).

That's not to say that sticking to trad is bad. If you find something you like and keep doing it, that's awesome. But it is to say that those talking about the things non-trad can do that trad really can't, are doing so from a position of experience with both sides of the fence.

One of the things I should note, since I think I tend to get lumped into the trad camp in these discussions is that I kind of am and kind of aren't. While my general tastes are still such that I'm not super-interested in the kind of things some non-trad games are trying to do, I'm not living in a bubble; I've run a couple games of Fate to see if it was for me (no) and ran an incomplete campaign using Cortex (less clear; I was clearly a bit trying to hammer a nail with a wrench, but its not clear that, given Cortex's toolbox nature whether I was just too lazy to do the heavy lifting to get it where I wanted it to be), and think I understand what people who, for example, are very much PbtA fans are getting out of it that they wouldn't be getting out of hacking a trad game in that direction (over and above having to take a lot of baggage with them that would be literally pointless). I also lean into at least neotrad sensibilities sometimes, for some games (Chill 3e is, I think, very much neotrad and I quite appreciated what it brought to a horror-investigation game, even if I'm hesitant to recommend it because of the issues with the author).

I also think there's a tendency for some D&D fans to fail to understand how different the experience can be of games even within the trad sphere when you're dealing with things that swing away from D&D mechanically and/or thematically. I sigh when I see another interesting looking new game is PbtA, but I do it just as much when I see its 5e based).

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

After reading that short piece, I started thinking about how resolution might be deconstructed. After a bit of experimentation I identified some basic elements

• system state
• fictional position
• player decision
• player goals
• gm decision
• roll

The above may be inputs and/or outputs. Nothing surprising, right. I then considered three roughly defined information types

• open
• hidden
• legitimated

(The last italicised because it unpacks in many different ways.) I then started assembling those according to the flows of different mechanics. I looked at Stonetop Persuade, Stonetop Clash, Dangerous Presence, TB2 Hunter, AW Layout a Plan, AW Eye on the Door, AW Loyal: Get to Work, TB2 Criminal, AW Go Aggro, DW Escape Route, 5e Stealth, 5e Athletics, 5e Persuasion, 5e Investigation, DW Tricks of the Trade, and others. (My process was in fact recursive for the obvious reasons.)

What I ended up with were diagrams that for each case mapped the inputs and outputs, with typically roll in the middle. I observed consistency (common elements and general structure) and diversity. Furnished with those diagrams, I then considered overarching play loops.

Generally, what I observed is that separating into "task" and "conflict" resolution is an extremely simplistic dichotomy that understates (or really, in my opinion, misstates) a very rich diversity.

Well, I am not in a position to comment on that as I have not seen these diagrams you speak of (sorry, I didn't read a LOT of this thread, so I probably missed something). I was simply responding to the blog post about 'resolution types', which didn't really go into how the author arrived at their classifications. My response to that post seems reasonable to me, but it isn't some highly analyzed position. I'm not sure what your 'rich diversity' is supposed to tell me though! When I classify things, I generally do so on the basis of something akin to 'engineering principles'. That is, what are the possibilities for ways that things could function, and which ones will meet my needs? I have broken things down GENERALLY into 'task' and 'intent' as the two most salient elements of the resolution style, though I am fully aware that actual instances of play/actual game designs are likely to have some mixed character. Resolution style is not the only dimension here though, there are also things like the source of fiction, and the level of engagement with things like resource subsystems which may create player-side dilemmas for example. I would consider things like 'task/situation/scene/conflict/tension' to be OUTCOMES, not different resolution types, myself. That is to say, a given example of a resolution process might be pretty zoomed in and only focus on a part of a scene, or the fiction might only allow of resolution at the most granular level (IE picking a lock during combat in 4e). Other situations might be much higher level, resolving whatever is at stake in the whole scene. In some cases an entire conflict could be resolved, either because it is fairly straightforward, OR because the resolution mechanism is fairly broad (IE a 4e SC), OR because the participants have simply decided to resolve things at a fairly zoomed out level in this particular case.

To be honest, I think most resolution systems can work at multiple levels of detail. In fact I am of the opinion that this is a general virtue of cases where intent is being explicitly addressed, as it generally means that the elements required for some sort of resolution are included and its a pretty scalable type of system.

As for types of information: Obviously there are various possibilities different systems can allow for. I'm not sure what 'legitimated' is, though. I would say there are different SOURCES of information, which might include external (something written down outside of play), determined through play, and possibly undetermined as of yet (not provided, missing from the game). I think though the key question is who's agenda is information flow serving, and how and why? I think @pemerton is the real expert on this analysis here, though, and my classification is mostly in keeping with his I think. There's also a question of player vs character information, which he also gets into a lot.

 

[Baron Opal II]

Until someone shows me the work, I don't believe it can be done.

I respectfully disagree, and will comment further when I have read the rules.

 

[FrogReaver]

And from yet another perspective you didn't read my post and cut straight to playing the victim card. And not even for yourself, possibly, but for those unfortunate put-upon gamers that aren't in this discussion anyway.

Stop white-knighting for people who don't need it.

Another whiff here, unfortunately. I'm repeating myself, but I think it's necessary: If someone has read one book, and refuses to read any others, they're not getting invited to any book clubs, no one's asking their opinions on books or writing, and they can be as performatively outraged as they want (or have others, I guess, be outraged on their behalf), but the facts are that their perspectives are quantifiably not relevant. What you're defending, with all this pearl-clutching, is the notion of someone blundering into a discussion about an Elmore Leonard book as someone who's never read it, but has some real interesting takes based on some sort of vague osmosis—like they read something on Reddit about the movie adaptation of it. That blunderer might be the smartest person in the world. Their input in this case is worth essentially zero.

Call that elitist or exclusionary if you want, but if so, come up with something to support your argument, instead of just trying to work the refs.

Please stop the personal attacks (highlighted in bold for reference).

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

The first RPG I owned was Classic Traveller, but the first one I played (and the second I owned) was Moldvay Basic. I couldn't work out how to make Traveller "go" once the prep had taken place; whereas Moldvay Basic sets out a clear procedure both for prep and for play.

I've played plenty of RPGs in the style I described - the core of play being the GM working from notes either directly or by extrapolation - and have GMed some of it, although I don't GM it especially well. (I struggle to stick to my notes if play suggests something more interesting.)

I think @Campbell has best described the appeal of this sort of play - there is something for the players to poke at and "explore", to build on for their action declarations. (This does require the GM to stick to their notes, or else the idea of leveraging the "game world" becomes purely illusory.) As per my post just upthread, Torchbearer is about as close as I can imagine coming to this.

Right, and my opinion/experience is that this 'trad' sort of play can be pretty brittle. The notes only have a certain level of resolution, they only cover certain areas, and the GM has limited ability to extrapolate in any kind of objective manner. These limitations tend towards a couple of things: First of all games tend to have a very distinct 'sweet spot' (like B/X and dungeon crawls); Secondly the GM has considerable motives for being non-objective and/or NOT following their notes; Thirdly play is, for practical reasons, generally bounded to a few locations or paths. More 'freeform' play is possible, and inevitably happens, but there's rather limited support. AD&D for instance does include some rules for 'how to build a castle' and what sort of followers high level PCs can get. You can also reuse the reaction and morale/obedience tables in various ways (IE to see what the king thinks of your crazy idea instead of whether the orc's eat you right away or not). However, 4e aside, there's not really any structure there, and classic map-and-key techniques don't really cut it. People have tried mind maps and other such things, but in the end it is often up to the GM to simply make something up. At least in AW/DW when that happens (which is all the time) the game has very definite processes and structure for it.

I guess I just generally wonder how much there is to actually poke and prod at!

 

[FrogReaver]

What’s the scope of a complication or hindrance? Can it take the game in an unexpected direction?

For example, the Redbrand Ruffians are a problem in Phandalin in Lost Mines of Phandelver. A small group of them confronts the PCs shortly after they arrive. If the PCs kill some of the Ruffians, it’s indicated that Townmaster Wester isn’t happy about it because he fears retaliation. If he confronts the PCs, and they try to assuage his concerns, what does success with hindrance and also failure look like? Could one potential complication be whether he declares them outlaws?

In he does, “success with hindrance” might mean that the PCs win him over, but they have to operate discretely until the problem is resolved. This would make it difficult to access services in town but not impossible (e.g., Townmaster Wester provides some token that identifies the PCs’ special status). However, failure means the town is closed off to them. The PCs can’t operate there, and even if they take out the Ruffians, that’s just confirming that they are also lawless hooligans.

Is that kind of outcome okay? Can an adventure be zagged when it was expected to zig?

It doesn't seem that such a process would work well with module play - but presumably if one wanted to play D&D this way then playing a module would be about the furthest thing from what they want.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

Well, I'll note you're mixing things that are very much supposed to be in-world resources with metagame resources in this sentence (spell slots usually actually represent things spellcasting characters can talk about in-world in some fashion). A lot of people are objecting to the very fact the latter exist (though I suspect to some of them it gets muddy when you start getting things that are supposed to be abstractions of in-world things (which I'm guessing is what "superiority dice" are since I'm not familiar with them).

So I think it can swing both ways here. I think there can be a consistent position for people who want to avoid the sort of metagame decision-making as much as possible (and yes, I'm aware some people say they don't feel any distinction, but for some there very much is such a distinction), and probably would prefer that any decision had a pretty direct map to an in-character decision-making, and for them a metacurrancy is anathema (and parallel things that sort of are sort of aren't aren't probably that much better).

(Note: this doesn't mean there aren't some inconsistencies to be found with this position sometimes, but I think its a valid position to have).

Honestly, I don't think there's anything 'valid' or 'invalid' about people's preferences, they are what they are, generally speaking.

Superiority Dice are the resource used by the 5e Battlemaster class. They're a purely abstract resource that completely refreshes at every short rest. I mean, obviously you can color this as 'resting' etc. but fundamentally its not different from 4e Fighter encounter powers (and not really much different from daily ones in this sense). Famously the 4e version are 'dissociated mechanics' or 'purely gamist', but the same criticism is almost never leveled at the 5e version of the same thing! My point being, preferences are HIGHLY contextual, and often less about game analysis and more about gamer politics...

 

[clearstream]

I’d like to explore the example a bit more. Let’s assume that the DM has indicated that this is a possible consequence. When the PCs go to fight the Ruffians, the DM notes this will have fallout if they kill someone, especially with the Townmaster who is afraid of retribution. This is known because the PCs can see how the townsfolk are afraid, and they’ve talked to a few people who mention the Townmaster in particular is trying to keep things together but feels like he can’t do much about the situation. So the PCs decide to enact justice in the way that they tend to do: they kill all that bad guys. The townspeople are happy that someone has come to kick Ruffian butt, but the Townmaster is freaked out.

From there, the DM explains what is happening and what consequence the Townmaster is considering: declaring them outlaws. He needs to show that he is a friend to the Ruffians to prevent them from hurting people in the town. The PCs try to negotiate. Maybe they suggest they can take care of the problem, but the Townmaster is wary. They roll because there are obviously consequences at stake, and …. Well, it’ll depend and could go one of the ways described in the previous post.

Success with a hindrance is the Townmaster has to make a show of things to the Ruffians. He agrees it would be helpful to deal with the Ruffian problem, and they’d appreciate it, but he can’t be seen showing any kind of support. Even though they’re themselves considered outlaws, the Ruffians have demonstrated that they will use violence to impose their will. However, the Townmaster slips the PCs a token to show to trusted people to gain their support.

Otherwise, on a failure, the PCs are properly declared outlaws. They could try to act like the Ruffians and get what they want by imposition, but they’re pretty much on their own when it comes to dealing with the Ruffians. No one is going to help them, and if they are on the losing side of things, then it sucks to be the PCs. Even if the PCs somehow prevail, they will probably need to do something to make restitution and show the Townmaster and people of Phandalin that they’re not a threat to it.

When I talk about this situation as a “zag”, it’s in the context of the adventure which (more or less) assumes the PCs heroically save the town from the Ruffians. Maybe the party kills them all, or they detail and take the members of the gang prisoner, but the rest of the adventure is set up to dispense the necessary hooks to get the PCs to go to the other places of interest (Thundertree, Cragmaw Castle, etc). With the zag, those hooks are gone. No one is going to talk to the PCs (definitely not openly). The PCs might still discover those things, but it’s going to be through other mechanisms. Perhaps they set out north from Phandalin and run into some of those situations naturally instead of via hook.

What I’m trying to suss out is to what extent having an adventure like that acts as a constraint, or how compatible this kind of play is compatible with having an adventure like that at all. Even if this consequence makes sense (it follows from the fiction, makes sense, is signaled as a consequence, etc), should one still keep the intended arrow of play in mind? Maybe instead of being declared outlaws, a more zig-aligned approach would be putting the PCs in the service of the Townmaster or requiring them to make an act of contrition towards the Ruffians as a way to diffuse the situation and avoid reprisals?

In my experience the likelihood of whatever PCs get interested in and how that unravels falling onto the path of a pre-written adventure is low. It's fine to have a map. It's useful to know something about a few NPCs. Just don't get too attached to any prepped plan. If a zag best follows, follow that zag.

Where I feel concerned is the notion of keeping "the intended arrow of play in mind." Whose intent? If the consequence follows from your group's fiction, makes sense, etc, then that is the arrow of your play.