D&D General What is player agency to you?

[pemerton]

If you don't sometimes nix a player's idea because of the existence of pre-generated fiction states, you're not really pursuing a simulationist agenda.

I assume that this is obvious enough that it doesn't need saying.

I also tend to find that every time one says it as bluntly as you have, it is taken as derisive!

 

[JAMUMU]

I assume that this is obvious enough that it doesn't need saying.

I also tend to find that every time one says it as bluntly as you have, it is taken as derisive!

That's not so much a failure of player agency, as a failure of the referee to set up realistic player expectations.

 

[pemerton]

The sailor background (I think) has a feat that they can get passage on a ship for you and your group. But really, any group? What if they are wanted for murder, does the ship (even if it is one they used to work on) still have to grant them passage?

Heaven forbid that a D&D game should include a scene reminiscent of the opening pages of Queen of the Black Coast, one of the most famous of all S&S stories!

 

[TwoSix]

D&D is not a narrative game. The DM is not forced to change their concept of the world, how the powers that be function, what kind of hierarchy exists.

My only pushback is that D&D is not traditionally a narrative game, but the more modern versions (particularly 5e), with their relatively loose non-combat resolutions, can be swerved in that direction with only a bit of effort.

If that effort doesn't fit your play priorities, then classic sim/trad D&D play is obviously the right choice.

If that means I'm not the DM for you, I'm not going to lose any sleep over it.

Knowing what kind of games you want to run and being able to recognize players with incompatible play priorities is definitely an important skill.

 

[pemerton]

I really do not care what the text says, they get an audience when it makes sense to, they might get denied when it does not. This text is not the law, it is a guideline, the setting easily trumps anything in it

To build on a point that @hawkeyefan made: imagine that someone picked up the 5e rulebook, read the Noble background feature, read the Action Surge class feature, and - based on the similarity of wording - just decided to treat them the same.

In that game Fighter players would be surging left, right and centre, and Noble players would be in audiences with their peers every second moment.

And the GM would do their job, of applying the rules, adjudicating consequences, presenting new situations, etc.

I don't see any particular reason why that game couldn't work. It certainly doesn't seem to contradict the rules text of the game. And it would seem to obviously be a higher-agency game than one in which the GM decides unilaterally what happens every time the player of a Noble PC seeks an audience.

(The first version of D&D that I know of to contemplate something a bit like what I've described is the original OA, published in the mid-80s. Various fighting and martial arts classes had action surge-style abilities ("ki powers") and yakuza had the ability to gather information and get help from their contacts.)

 

[mamba]

Let's say you tell the group it will take them 10 minutes to get to point x in the city. But you forgot that one of them is an urchin.

The player reminds you his pc has the urchin background. Do you, having already determined that 10 minutes is the shortest time (because you made the map), say nope, sorry - 10 minutes?

the route through the city is as long as it is, so if the urchin can halve the time, the time is 5 min

I am not seeing the relation to the denied audience, this is more akin to the fighter’s ability from earlier, no one but the fighter / urchin is involved, so there is no denying the ability.

 

[mamba]

I don't see any particular reason why that game couldn't work.

neither do I, I am not sure what your point is

I am not allowing the surge every time and the audience never. If every once in a while there is no audience despite this text, then so be it. The text does not say the audience has to be a success, I see no reason why it needs to even happen, that is all.

As I said, I could about as easily let it happen and deny any and all requests by the party, then we would not have this conversation, and yet the result is basically the same, so what does the insistence on the audience accomplish?

You have the exact same outcome and the exact same amount of agency denial, yet you are happy with one and complain about the other. I find my view more consistent

 

[pemerton]

the route through the city is as long as it is, so if the urchin can halve the time, the time is 5 min

This is bizarre to me. The urchin ability clearly is not about super-speed! It's about knowing pathways that ordinary people don't use.

If every possible pathway were literally mapped out, then the urchin ability would make no sense.

no, the player took the action, they just did not get the desired outcome.

If you attack an orc and miss, is that denying agency?

If I miss because the GM decides it makes no sense that I can hurt the Orc, then yes!

Which is what you are positing in relation to the Noble background ability.

 

[Oofta]

This is what it comes down to. No shade. Some DMs run the worlds that exist in their heads, and the players are visitors in that world, and if they don't grok the rules then EFFEM!

Nothing wrong with that.

I think as long as the DM is clear on expectations and how they run the game, then it's all good. In the example of the noble background, I'll discuss with the player what it does and doesn't mean. I'll also set up other restrictions for balance purposes, for example you can't just have a small army at your beck and call. Well, unless the entire group agrees and we come up with some ideas and ground rules that work for everyone.

But to put it simply, whether I'm DMing or playing, I prefer games were we utilize traditional D&D roles of authority. A line in a background does not usurp the authority of the DM. The players don't get to tell the DM how the world works, the DM doesn't get to tell the player what to do with their character.

I'll work with players to try to figure out how to make a background fun and rewarding if they care. I'll ask people if they have any goals or things they want to accomplish and we'll discuss how and whether we can make that happen. But I won't guarantee success and I will always put world building logic slightly ahead of player requests. It's never caused any significant issues over the decades I've been a DM.

 

[Mort]

the route through the city is as long as it is, so if the urchin can halve the time, the time is 5 min

I am not seeing the relation to the denied audience, this is more akin to the fighter’s ability from earlier, no one but the fighter / urchin is involved, so there is no denying the ability.

This is the big difference.

To me, both abilities are essentially the same and both are between the player and the DM.

The Noble in question isn't some real 3rd party, they are a DM construct (just like the city) and the DM can EASILY comes up with a reason to or not to grant an audience.

For other PCs (non noble backgrounds, even if they are now officially nobles) getting an audience would involve roleplaying or a check or some other give and take mechanism, and might well fail. But for the "noble," he gets the audience (and all the complications/problems that might ensue).

Just like non urchins might be able to cut their time through the city, with knowledge checks, hiring a guide - all sorts of ways. But the urchin juicy does it.