D&D General What is player agency to you?

[soviet]

I thought most if not all were reasonable.

I think you have a good point about a stand-in for when the primary noble is away. That's definitely something I would allow, assuming I or the player thought of it in the moment. It definitely should be what happens IMO.

Did you agree with the City of Brass example?

No, I think the audience should be given, if only out of curiosity or malice and so on. Doesn't mean the noble will get what they want out of the meeting though.

 

[pemerton]

No, I think the audience should be given, if only out of curiosity or malice and so on. Doesn't mean the noble will get what they want out of the meeting though.

Why are the PCs on the City of Brass? Who established that part of the fiction?

 

[soviet]

Let's say the DM based on their prep.

Presumably they don't know all those facts about this demiplane - his PC just got here.

I say it's high player agency RPGing.

Why the heck should the DM take away the egg-finder player's agency to decide for his PC to go to a demiplane that has no, and never had any life?

The PC is there, and presumably the PC is alive. Can't another adventurer be there, dead or alive, with eggs in their backpack or something? I don't really understand the significance of these eggs TBH.

 

[FrogReaver]

I simply re-ask the question: who decided that the demiplane is lifeless - the GM, or the player?

I just answered that... The GM.

And when the player chooses to have their PC go there, what do they know about it?

Assume they were going to an unknown demiplane when they made that decision.

I mean, if they know that it is lifeless, then why are they looking for eggs?

Assume the player doesn't know it's lifeless when he looks for eggs.

 

[soviet]

I'm not saying that an egg-finding PC should find eggs everywhere they look. Under the bed? Eggs. Under my hat? Eggs. In the Astral Plane? Eggs. It seems to me to be a silly example that doesn't reflect anyone's actual gaming (I guess unless it's a comedy game or something).

 

[FrogReaver]

EDIT: To speak as if the setting has an objective existence, such that the player chooses to have their PC go to <this place>, and then <this place> just happens to be devoid of life, is obscurantism. Someone decided to invent an imaginary, lifeless place. That person exercised agency over the fiction.

This wasn't here when I replied and it makes little sense to me. I've declared 3 times counting now that it was the DM who authored the fiction of a lifeless demiplane. I don't understand why we are stuck on this point that I agree with you on.

 

[pemerton]

@FrogReaver

So here is the scenario at the table: the GM presents, in whatever fashion, the opportunity for the player to have their PC travel to an unknown demiplane with unknown characteristics (eg there's a Well of Many Worlds or something like that). The player declares that their PC takes up the opportunity (eg steps through the portal, dives into the Well, or whatever else). Now the GM tells the player - at some appropriate juncture, such as when the player has their PC look for eggs - that there are none, as it's a lifeless demiplane.

To me that is obviously low player agency RPGing. The player is just prompting the GM to reveal the GM's conception of the fiction. The player is not establishing that fiction.

 

[soviet]

If egg-hunting is a particular PC's schtick, it seems strange to teleport them to an eggless dimension with seemingly no foreshadowing. It's a bit like sending the all rogues and illusionists party to the temple of 100% mindless undead.

 

[FrogReaver]

@FrogReaver

So here is the scenario at the table: the GM presents, in whatever fashion, the opportunity for the player to have their PC travel to an unknown demiplane with unknown characteristics (eg there's a Well of Many Worlds or something like that). The player declares that their PC takes up the opportunity (eg steps through the portal, dives into the Well, or whatever else). Now the GM tells the player - at some appropriate juncture, such as when the player has their PC look for eggs - that there are none, as it's a lifeless demiplane.

To me that is obviously low player agency RPGing. The player is just prompting the GM to reveal the GM's conception of the fiction. The player is not establishing that fiction.

Okay, i'm good with all your setup here. So we don't need to rehash that part.

To me - there's no way to change this scenario to be higher player agency without also taking away the players agency to explore the DM authored world? If you think there is, i challenge you to show me how.

 

[FrogReaver]

If egg-hunting is a particular PC's schtick, it seems strange to teleport them to an eggless dimension with seemingly no foreshadowing. It's a bit like sending the all rogues and illusionists party to the temple of 100% mindless undead.

Maybe it was rolled on a random demiplane table?