D&D General Fighting Law and Order

[Aldarc]

So you've answered my question (thanks for that!) but sadly, it's the answer I kind of expected but didn't want to see: I can't ever truly ambush or even surprise the PCs - they always get a warning.

But, I'd guess the PCs can take steps to ambush their NPC foes and, if lucky, drop those foes before they even knew trouble was upon them. So how is that fair, in terms of in-fiction consistency?

IMHO, the problem is that you appear to be thinking about this in terms of D&D prep where you pre-plan in advance an ambush or surprise encounter. That's not fundamentally how PbtA games work.

The GM frames a situation and then asks the players what they would do in response. If their PC's actions trigger a Move, then the player roll. Based on the roll, the GM adjudicates the negative consequences (i.e., soft and hard moves) as appropriate to the fiction to set up a new situation. What you want to do here is outside of your job description as a GM in PbtA.

This doesn't mean that the PCs can't be ambushed. For example, the PCs may plan an ambush for some goblins at a campfire. The player rolls a 6- on whatever move they triggered while trying to stealthily get into position (e.g., Defy Danger). The GM decides that instead of the PCs ambushing the goblins, the goblins have actually ambushed them! It turns out that those goblins were the bait! (GM Move: Turn their move back on them.)

Alternatively, the GM may set up a situation that points to a potential danger of goblins in the area: reveal an unwelcome truth or show signs of an approaching danger. This can pave the way for a goblin ambush but you aren't supposed to plan one in advance.

 

[Oofta]

Who chooses what the rumours are, and what they point to? And what do they have regard to in making those choices? Who decides who the NPCs are, what they want, and how they respond?

I know that some people who build words and prepare adventures make all those choices, as GM, more-or-less independently of the players and their play of their PCs.

I regard that as railroading.

I haven't said anything about the powers of the PCs. Do you mean players?

Even focusing on players, and as I replied to @Micah Sweet upthread, avoiding railroading doesn't require the players doing more than declare actions for their PCs. The key is the method the GM uses to say what happens as a result.

I throw out various rumors but the players can, and do, come up with ideas on their own. All I ask is that we decide on a general direction at the end of a session so I can prep for the next. Things still go in a completely different direction than I had expected now an then.

But by your definition it seems like pretty much every living person that has ever lived is on a railroad. I don't get to decide how my neighbor is going to respond when I say hello. I certainly didn't get to decide how Judy answered when I asked her to the big dance in high school.

People are pretty constrained in what realistic choices they have as well. We generally have far more options than what our ancestors had. But I was never going to be a pro ball player, my older brother took over the farm so that wasn't really an option. Through most of history people had far more restrictions than we did.

So if everything is a railroad unless you get to control what other people think and do, whether you get that job offer you didn't even apply for, everyone is living on a railroad in the real world as well.

You have an extreme definition of railroad.

 

[Oofta]

Without knowing your experiences of PbtA beyond your posts, it seems to me that your thought (that I've reproduced just above the snip) is very plausible.

Compare the way two examples of play begin:

5e D&D (Basic PDF, p 2): DM - After passing through the craggy peaks, the road takes a sudden turn to the east and Castle Ravenloft towers before you. Crumbling towers of stone keep a silent watch over the approach. They look like abandoned guardhouses. Beyond these, a wide chasm gapes, disappearing into the deep fog below. A lowered drawbridge spans the chasm, leading to an arched entrance to the castle courtyard. The chains of the drawbridge creak in the wind, their rust-eaten iron straining with the weight. From atop the high strong walls, stone gargoyles stare at you from hollow sockets and grin hideously. A rotting wooden portcullis, green with growth, hangs in the entry tunnel. Beyond this, the main doors of Castle Ravenloft stand open, a rich warm light spilling into the courtyard.

Player - I want to look at the gargoyles. I have a feeling they’re not just statues.

Apocalypse World (original version, p 152): Marie the brainer goes looking for Isle, to visit grief upon her, and finds her eating canned peaches on the roof of the car shed with her brother Mill and her lover Plover (all NPCs).

“I read the situation,” her player says.

“You do? It’s charged?” I say.

“It is now.”

“Ahh,” I say. I understand perfectly: the three NPCs don’t realize it, but Marie’s arrival charges the situation. If it were a movie, the sound track would be picking up, getting sinister.​

If we focus just on the events of the fiction, both involve a character arriving somewhere and sizing things up.

But if we look at these through the lens of the dynamics of play, they could hardly be more different. In the D&D example, the GM is establishing the mood ("towers of stone keep a silent watch"), and the players follow the GM's lead (the GM mentions gargoyles, the player has their PC investigate further).

In the AW example, the player establishes the reason for and rationale of the scene (ie Marie's player has decided that Marie will find Isle and visit grief upon her; the GM provides an opportunity in response to this, by narrating Isle sitting on the roof of the car shed with her companions). It is Marie's player who establishes the mood of the scene, by declaring it to be charged.

These differences are further reflected in the divergent approaches the two systems take to resolution of the declared action.

Btw, @Micah Sweet and @Oofta, the difference between these two examples is highly relevant to my remarks about what I experience as railroaded RPGing.

So it's a railroad unless your character decides things about the world that are completely out of their control.

That's a unique definition.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

Sounds like your PCs have a lot on their plate.

If they have stupendous amounts of money they might consider contracting that assassin-cult to wipe out the death-druids and hope for mutual annihilation (or the PCs just mop up what's left of the winner). That leaves them with the black dragon and the elder-orb cult. No problem. Right?

I think, on the design stuff, the conversation has reached a natural conclusion--we've understood each other, but have no impulse to change position.

As for my PCs--yes, they do. As it stands, they have hope of redeeming the assassins (TL;DR: party unknowingly fulfilled some prophecies, and the Bard specifically has been identified by one faction within the cult as the Lord of the Ravens, their prophesied dark messiah; he has chosen to accept this mantle, with intent to show the cult they don't have to murder people to stay true to their beliefs.) They're currently on the hunt for more info on the black dragon. It's not clear what the druids are up to, the party slapped them down pretty hard early on and they've been adjusting their approach. And the elder orb continues to sniff around for more ways to escape the planet--the party has foiled them twice already, without strictly knowing that's what they were doing.

Thus far, it's looking like the assassin-cult will probably be the first long-term front concluded, but the players had until very recently long neglected the black dragon, and thus its plans have proceeded while they were busy putting out fires elsewhere; this has now risen far enough to draw their direct attention. (Noting: as my players know, I don't do this just because they fail to look into something just once, 'cause I consider that a jerk move when there are multiple fronts. With the black dragon, they've repeatedly either chosen not to investigate, or when they did, only looked in a bit and then moved on to other things. That sustained pattern has led to the dragon making headway. Two Grim Portents have already come to pass. First, major rises in gang violence, which the party has traced to alchemical steroids, seemingly made using the dragon's own blood/magic. Second, the party has learned that at least one member of the officially unofficial merchant-prince council is in the dragon's pocket--but whether the mole is a traitor, a patsy, or a victim, isn't clear yet.)

I suspect they'll find a way to address it...but many, many, many questions remain about how much damage it might wreak physically, financially, and psychologically on the city and the region. And will they be able to nip it in the bud--or will they have to beat a hasty retreat from the only home most of them have known, and find a way to fight back as heroes in exile? Find out next time...in the Desert.

 

[Oofta]

I've never seen anyone say that, and I've absolutely never said it. I said it doesn't happen EXCEPT for the RARE bad DM, and 2 among bunches and bunches is pretty darn rare. Especially when it's internet talk and leaves room for doubt on whether it's even happening with these posters.

Because, and this is something else I've said, rules CAN'T help address it. Bad DM's are bad regardless of the rules. No game rule can cure that. You don't hamstring the myriad of average and good DMs for the few rare bad ones that won't stop anyway.

I agree. I had a longer post but ... meh. Suffice to say the solution a lot of people, many of whom don't seemingly even play D&D any more, believe that PbtA (Powered by the Apocalypse) game like Dungeon World fix most GMing problems. I disagree. Some specific scenarios that happen in D&D would probably not happen in a PbtA game but a different set of rules is never going to make a bad DM into a good GM.

I also think the PbtA approach is largely incompatible with D&D's style and flow. How the aspects of PbtA that people are pushing would be applied to D&D without changing the nature of D&D gets real fuzzy, real fast. Some terms are generic enough that they can be used for both, but using a different term (i.e. "fronts") doesn't really change anything.

 

[Aldarc]

Some terms are generic enough that they can be used for both, but using a different term (i.e. "fronts") doesn't really change anything.

So why do you think that 5e designers like Mike Mearls and SlyFlourish believe that DW's use of Fronts are useful tools for playing D&D? Do you think that they are wrong or misguided about how to play D&D?

 

[Oofta]

So why do you think that 5e designers like Mike Mearls and SlyFlourish believe that DW's use of Fronts are useful tools for playing D&D? Do you think that they are wrong or misguided about how to play D&D?

They can use whatever terms they want. I'm saying that I've pretty much always used Fronts in my game without even knowing that term as applied to a game. That the term can apply to many RPGs but it doesn't have any real impact on the quality of DMing. It's just another approach on how to think about the game.

 

[Aldarc]

They can use whatever terms they want. I'm saying that I've pretty much always used Fronts in my game without even knowing that term as applied to a game. That the term can apply to many RPGs but it doesn't have any real impact on the quality of DMing. It's just another approach on how to think about the game.

And THAT is precisely the point about why some people brought up Dungeon World in the first place when discussing the situation in the OP!

 

[Oofta]

And THAT is precisely the point about why some people brought up Dungeon World in the first place when discussing the situation in the OP!

Concepts like hard and soft moves simply don't really apply to D&D without changing the fundamentals of the game.

Things like "...your goal isn’t to slaughter the adventurers but to create a campaign world that revolves around their actions and decisions, and to keep your players coming back for more!" from the DMG do directly apply to the OP's solution to their perceived problem. Based on the end result of the group apparently breaking up, perhaps they should have listened to the advice.

 

[Maxperson]

Point to the post where I said rules were perfect and I will be happy to do exactly as you have requested.

So this is effectively an admission that a rules change won't stop bad DMs from being bad DMs. It's a clear evasion because I never asked for rules to be perfect. I simply asked for a single rule that could not be broken by bad DMs. If you can't point to even one rule that will help fix the situation by being unbreakable, then bad DMs will simply break any rule you put into place to stop them from being bad DMs.

Rules are not a lot of guidance, therapy and the will to stop a person from being a bad DM, which is what it takes to change bad behaviors.