D&D General Fighting Law and Order

[Baron Opal II]

I agree with this one, as it's much the same as I don't allow smoking in my house.

I do thank you for your answer, but do you have an example of one with no "medical part". Where someone is just doing something "because".

I can only think of two times someone was randomly or intentionally being a jerk at my house (which is the only place I game anymore). The disruption was minor enough to be ignored at the time. They were not invited back and informed why at a later point. This wasn't for a game but a different social situation.

But wait, you put it on the person with food allergies / preferences? Odd, no one liked that when I typed it. And why would it not be as nice?

Mostly I ask everyone to bring their own meal/take care of their own food requirements. But If I am having a group come over, and one person makes the demand that no one eat any eat, I'm not going to call up each person and forward on that demand. If that one person wants to call everyone and ask, I'm fine with that. I don't even consider unreasonable requests, so I will do what I want.

For me, it is because I asked ahead of time and was not informed. If you tell me ahead of time you can't handle the smell of lemons, there won't be a lemon flavored dish. If you mention it after the fact, well, the meal is already prepared. We'll make something for you, but if the aroma is too much for you I have a nice porch where you can eat. It's all in the timing.

If someone told me "no one else can do [X] while I'm there", it would greatly depend on what [X] was. Is it a serious allergy or medical thing? I would consider it. If it is a dietary or behavior preference, they may be better served in a different game. I will listen, but I am highly unlikely to inconvenience others for a single person's accommodation. If you wish to smoke, you can do so outside. If you are a militant vegetarian, keep it to yourself and enjoy the non-meat option I prepared for you. Do not give other people grief about their dietary preferences. We are going to enjoy some wine with our dinner. If you don't want any, there are other soft beverages that I have available. If you are adverse, let me know ahead of time and I will make sure there are other more palatable options. If this is going to cause you to lose your AA coin, then you might be better served with a different game.

For me, gaming is a time with friends well spent. We adventure, consume good food, and socialize at my home. It is important to me that those who are guests in my house are well accommodated. But, you do not get to inconvenience, belittle, or snipe at my other guests.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

In your post you typed "You are very specifically and explicitly instructed to only trigger moves when the fiction requires it, and never for any other reason."

I think this is a great rule. Often when a GM does anything or takes any sort of game move, players will complain. Often players will add in all sorts of thier own reasons why they think a GM is making a move. Like a player might say "oh, the GM is just having a monster attack us as we are joking around" or "they are mad at us" or something like that.

"The Fiction" would be a great boon to the illusionisum of the game. When a GM makes a move, they can just quickly add "As the Fiction requires". And the players, beliving in that rule, will nod yes and say "by the Fiction".

Except that's not what "the fiction" means--at all. You CANNOT add "as the fiction requires." That would be an absolute abrogation of the rules of Dungeon World. Utterly unacceptable.

You, as GM, can only make a move if it is already obvious that that is what should happen (with one minor exception: "think offscreen too," meaning stuff that will become obvious sooner rather than later, but ONLY in response to a player failing a move--meaning, they still know something went wrong, they just don't know what it was yet.) E.g., the ogre charges at a player, they Defy Danger to avoid getting hit, and they roll 6 or less (a "failed" or "missed" roll.) The fiction just means...the stuff currently going on. In this case, a failure to avoid being attacked. What happens if you fail to avoid being attacked? You get hurt. THAT is what "when the fiction requires it" means. You cannot invoke it as some divine plan that the players must meekly accept. You can only say, "You have to take damage, because you just got hit by an ogre" or the like.

This is explained in two pithy phrases:

1. "You have to do it, to do it." This means, you--whether player or GM--have to actually do the actions, within the fictional space, in order for you to make any moves. A player cannot just declare, "I Discern Realities." That would, in fact, be completely against the spirit of the game. Instead, the player must say something like, "I check the bookcase for anything weird--first, just looking to see if it has any signs of magical effects, but if the coast seems clear, checking for secret compartments, concealed latches, anywhere something might be hidden." That description is doing the actions of Discern Realities ("When you closely study a situation or person") and thus you may use it.
2. "If you do it, you do it." This means you--whether player or GM--must use a move when it is triggered. If you are "act[ing] despite an imminent threat or suffer[ing] a calamity," you must say how you deal with it and roll. (This is the move Defy Danger.) Once something has been established in the fiction, meaning, once the table knows a certain situation is true because it's literally happening in front of them in the imagined world, then any moves that are triggered by that situation must be used. Of course, you could simply decide not to act, that's also valid, but then the move wouldn't trigger (because you wouldn't be "act[ing] despite an imminent threat.")

These two concepts together mean if, and only if, the fiction requires a move to occur, then that move will occur. But "the fiction" just means...the stuff happening around the characters. It emphatically does NOT mean some mystical unknown plan the GM can impose on the players. It emphatically does NOT mean the GM can say, "The fiction requires it" and the players must meekly accept. Exactly the opposite! If the GM cannot show that the CURRENT state of the world--the right now stuff in front of the players--requires a particular result, then the fiction DOES NOT support them.

You can't use the fiction as an excuse--it's right there for everyone to see! Even if the move you make is "offscreen," the reason you've made the move--a player failing a move--happens right out in public for everyone to see. You can't dismiss player criticism with the fiction.

This is needed for some players.

Tell a player a potion of healing costs 1000 gold, they will just rant and rave and metagame and say "oh, the DM is just trying to use up and take all our gold to force us to go on the adventure"

Tell a player that a potion of healing costs 1000 gold, "By the Fiction" and they will nod yes and say "By the Fiction" and the game will roll on.

That sounds absolutely horrible, and yeah, I can't blame a player for flipping out about you telling them that a potion of healing costs 1000 gp!

And I have yet to meet a single person who would be such an obstinate jerk. Moreover, if we're now allowed to bring up players who would try to pass off dirt as more valuable than gold, am I allowed to bring up horrible unacceptable GMs and how we need a "shield" against them, too? Or is this another instance of the argumentation double standard, where it's perfectly fine for folks to complain about absolutely horrible players and use them as a justification for absolute, unilateral GM power, but it's not fine for folks to complain about absolutely horrible GMs and use them as a criticism of absolute, unilateral GM power?

 

[EzekielRaiden]

In that event, you start a new campaign (which I also recommended).

So we are again left with put up, shut up, or the nuclear option.

As said before: Surely there is a better way than defaulting to those three.

 

[Micah Sweet]

So we are again left with put up, shut up, or the nuclear option.

As said before: Surely there is a better way than defaulting to those three.

Not true. You can talk about it with the players, see what they think. But if you can't reach an agreement, then yeah, it comes down to those three.

I will say I am strongly against re-writing history, as a DM or a player, even if it works against me, and would definitely argue against any "do-over" suggestion.

 

[Baron Opal II]

What should one do if thise events make it so it cannot continue from that point? Because the looming specter (not to over-use the term) of TPK, or an unplayable adventure, was specifically one of the issues brought up by the OP.

TPK - The PCs are captured, dead or missing. Continue with a great escape or roll up new characters.

Unplayable adventure - The PCs regroup and do something else until they solve the block. Then they can return. Or, not, if the players thought the adventure was terrible.

 

[Oofta]

So we are again left with put up, shut up, or the nuclear option.

As said before: Surely there is a better way than defaulting to those three.

If abject failure is off the table, the game loses something for me. If that means the nuclear option TPK, so be it. If there is no TPK possibility our successes don't mean much either.

 

[Oofta]

I don't know if I'd describe D&D as not a story-based game. So much of the wording in the books describes it as exactly that. All the published adventures can be described as exactly that. In my experience, both personal and hearing people here describe their play, it is often exactly that. There's some kind of story... some plot in place or perhaps multiple plots, and the players engage with those in some way.

As for the example of the doors of Moria, viewing that as nothing happening seems very odd to me. At the very least, time passed, and the thing in the waters drew closer or awakened from slumber or what have you.



And yet I imagine you accept things like Action Surges and Raging and initiative order without really being phased, right?



Right. I mean... Hit Points are a pacing mechanic at the center of D&D combat. Mounting danger as hit points dwindle... it's all right there. You're not avoiding the thing you claim to not like. It's just in a form that you've internalized to the point of not seeing it for what it is.



Perhaps this can be attributed to your low experience with Dungeon World? Perhaps those that are more familiar and are claiming otherwise may be more informed than you, and maybe you could try and understand why they say what they say instead of digging in your heels to try and make sure that your idea is "right"?

I'm asking a question and trying to get clarification of how it works. How is trying to better understand how a different system works digging in my heels?

 

[Lanefan]

People, me included, have often said something like "Dungeon World tells everyone when they need to say something." Its more than that, it is a VERY concise set of directions for WHEN to talk, WHAT to say, and HOW to say it.

Which seems a bit odd, given that the bolded is also the exact function of a script in a play or movie.

I don't think your games are (or are intended to be) scripted in the least. That said, if everyone's input is that tightly constrained how can any of the participants say or do something unexpected, or with unexpected timing?

 

[FrozenNorth]

Technically none of them exist so they aren't constrained by any game rules. So that's completely irrelevant to the conversation and is dodging the question. If you can't have an honest discussion about how this might work for an adventuring party in the game don't bother answering.

My proposal was entirely valid. You just didn’t like it.

Here are a couple of others:
DM: Gandalf, you failed your Lore roll with the consequence that the Watcher in the Water attacks you.
Frodo’s player: Wait! I use the Protect Another move.
DM: How?
Frodo’s player: Wouldn’t the monster rather go after the plump halfling rather than the tough and gamey wizard?
DM: … … I’ll allow it.

Or (though this is from Monster of the Week, not DW, so I can’t confirm it translates). Frodo has used his last point of luck, and is therefore doomed under the game rules. The DM thus decides to attack Frodo rather than Gandalf.

 

[Oofta]

No worries. Happy to help.


@EzekielRaiden provides his explanation on that first question here. The short answer is, "Sure, if it makes sense in the fiction."

It is possible for the monster to attack multiple characters. The monster isn't necessarily bound by D&D's action economy. The GM may only focus on one PC at a time, possibly the one who answers first to the question "What do you do?" And since it has been established that the monster is attacking multiple PCs at the same time, the GM can also chain consequences - successes, mixed successes, and failures - between PCs. There's no initiative in this game. So the GM is responsible for shifting the limelight between the PCs as it makes sense in the narrative.

If Merry and Pippin chose to sit the fight out, then the GM could still turn and ask Merry's player: "Merry, you see your friend Frodo being grappled by this tentacle monster. Frodo has the bond, 'Merry always has my back when things get tough.' So what do you do with Frodo in this tough situation?"


Obviously, it's not my place to tell you how it affects you. That's for you to decide, which you likely already have. I am, however, pointing out that there are clearly some prominent content creators in D&D who don't share your opinion on this matter. Simple as that. I understand you disagree. I understand that Dungeon World doesn't fit your preferred roleplaying playstyle. And I understand that you dislike Dungeon World. Gods know, it's not as if you haven't made that point abundantly clear already. I am neither trying to convince you to like or play Dungeon World nor am I in any way trying to invalidate your roleplaying preferences.

So here's my issue with some of this. Let's call the OP's scenario specifically designed to end in TPK a "rocks fall everyone dies" moment. It doesn't have to be this specific scenario, but any scenario where TPK is effectively guaranteed.

I would never run a rocks fall everyone dies scenario. I don't see the point, I'd just talk to the players about the issues I have and we'd figure things out. However, in DW people have said that a rocks fall everyone dies scenario could not happen. Period, full stop. But if the tentacle monster can attack multiple people because the fiction demands it, why can't the fiction demand that rocks fall everyone dies? If the fiction demands that the tentacle monster attacks everyone, couldn't it also demand that each tentacle does enough damage to kill the characters?

I understand that wouldn't be in the spirit of the game, I don't think rocks fall everyone dies is in the spirit of any RPG. I just don't see how the rules can stop the DM or GM from pulling out enough rocks to end up with the same result.