D&D General What is player agency to you?

[pemerton]

How is this any different than a rogue who dresses and acts like a noble.

For the same reason the princess can feel the pea beneath the mattress, but a rogue can't no matter how they are dressed. The Noble background rests on the premise that nobility - high birth - reveals itself in the person.

 

[Maxperson]

For the same reason the princess can feel the pea beneath the mattress, but a rogue can't no matter how they are dressed. The Noble background rests on the premise that nobility - high birth - reveals itself in the person.

And what of the extremely low birth noble who was raised to nobility because his father was a very, very successful thief and bought the patent?

 

[pemerton]

Unless you get into divine right to be noble that's able to be sensed by other nobles, and that opens a rather large can of worm

It needn't be divine right. Aristotle didn't have a theory of divine right, but did have a theory of natural nobility.

As for the can of worm, it's no different from that opened up by the fact that a dragon can fly despite lacking the physiology or wingspan to do so. Fantasy can't be reconciled with knowledge of how social processes, physical processes etc actually work.

 

[FrogReaver]

that is fine, I just took a basic D&D adventure as the starting point, if it does not map well to the system, then so be it. If e.g. there are no maps and stuff like that is handwaived and TotM only, just say so.

I assume the basic ingredients still exist, namely: 1) enemies to overcome, who / what decides who those are, don’t care for the actual combat rules, only whether this is all system driven (which it sounded like for BitD from your description), or the GM has some agency here, 2) NPCs to interact with, what decides who they are and their reactions, 3) secrets to uncover (the ambushes, traps and secret doors of the example adventure), how are they placed and discovered, 4) treasure, we got that already

Sorry, I wasn't intending to be condescending.

 

[Maxperson]

It needn't be divine right. Aristotle didn't have a theory of divine right, but did have a theory of natural nobility.

As for the can of worm, it's no different from that opened up by the fact that a dragon can fly despite lacking the physiology or wingspan to do so. Fantasy can't be reconciled with knowledge of how social processes, physical processes etc actually work.

Dragons can fly because of dragon magic, though. As a personal thing, I really dislike things that can't be reconciled in a way that makes sense. If I can't reconcile it was written, if possible I change it so that I can.

 

[Maxperson]

Sorry, I wasn't intending to be condescending.

Right. That's reserved to describe prisoners who are escaping from prison.

 

[pemerton]

And what of the extremely low birth noble who was raised to nobility because his father was a very, very successful thief and bought the patent?

They were truly a noble all along!

I mean, it's not as if non-modern conceptions of social role and status don't have ways of accommodating occasional instances of social mobility.

But if you drill down too far, of course it makes no sense. Just like flying dragons can't be explained, and the economics of the LotR can't be explained.

Or consider your adventuring party who travels from Faerun to the UK. Suppose one is a lycanthrope, and their cells end up being examined under microscope. What would be revealed? There's no coherent answer to that question, as we can only talk about the relationship between cells, disease and microscopy in terms of actual biological and optical processes, and the truth of those things entails that lycanthropy is impossible!

 

[FrogReaver]

Right. That's reserved to describe prisoners who are escaping from prison.

The dad jokes are strong with you.

 

[pemerton]

Dragons can fly because of dragon magic, though.

Ok, then nobles can be recognised in virtue of social status magic. There, done!

 

[Micah Sweet]

Because they can recognise a person of high station.

That high station reveals itself is the whole premise of the Noble background.

So again, just the rules widget.

Backgrounds in 5e are to me really incongruous with the general drive of the rules.