"Oddities" in fantasy settings - the case against "consistency"

[Crimson Longinus]

On this, I agree with @Bedrockgames: it produces weird or constraining outcomes, such as no one being able to work miracles unless they are also a mighty warrior.

I am not hardcore about this, NPC cleric that doesn't have weapon proficiencies would be fine by me. Though of course a cleric with str and dex of eight hardly is a mighty warrior anyway. But certainly a priest that is able to channel powerful divine miracles is in some sense mighty. They're not just some random commoner.

But yes, to me classes are things that have certain metaphysical existence and tell us about something about the fictional concepts they represent, even though we can be a bit fuzzy about it. Wizard magic actually is a different thing than the warlock magic, this is a diffidence that exists both in the rules and in the setting. It just makes sense to treat it this way to me. When I don't want fiction to reflect this, then I don't use a game with classes to begin with. Bizarrely specific arbitrary power packages that are just mechanics and are not attached to the fiction of the setting simply do not appeal to me one bit.

 

[Bedrockgames]

This one is especially interesting, because in AD&D all thief abilities progress uniformly, whereas in 2nd ed D&D the player can choose (within certain parameters) how to allocate points to abilities. Does this mean that the two rulesets are describing different fictional worlds? To me, that would be a strange conclusion to draw!

Exactly. For the record I prefer the 2E approach. But I think both classes really suggest they are more like windows into a wider world. Presumably there is someone in the world who isn't technically leveled as a thief or any other class but has figured out how to pick locks with incredible accuracy. And in fairness the PHB for 2E provides a baseline for these skills for all other characters, but again when you are talking about the broader world it just doesn't make sense to limit having a high ability to pick pockets to only people who have several levels of thief (especially when we all know there are people in the world who can pick pockets very well but would have little or zero of the other thief abilities).

 

[Crimson Longinus]

I don't really follow this. I mean, what does being "classed" mean in the fiction?

And if there can be "non playable" beings in the world, why can't one of them be (say) a human who is able to cast spells while wearing armour?

Why can't a god bestow on some (non-player) worshipper the ability to do such-and-such unique miraculous thing?

Etc.

What you're describing doesn't seem about consistency in the fiction at all, but rather some sort of meta-game requirement.

It seems to me that if such characters exist in the fiction of the setting, but the character creation rules do not allow us to make them as playable characters, then this might be a wrong rule system to use with this setting.

 

[Lanefan]

I am trying to play a game with my friends and we all want to have fun. So we work together to make sure we all have fun, and we can't have fun if we can't trust each other or if we go all Lord of the Flies on each other. When you're in the field, you need societal rules even more, because you have no one else to rely on other than the other PCs.

That reliance isn't born of societal rules, it's born of sheer self-preservation in the face of common peril and the realization that there's strength in numbers.

The only reason your games don't fall apart is for completely meta reasons, because you know it's a group game and not a solo game--in reality, you're not going to go fight the lich-queen with someone you can't trust not to steal from you or stab you in the back.

In theory, yes. In practice, when Joe the Fighter is known to be a cheating thieving bastard who'd rip your heart out if it made him a few g.p. and yet he's the best sword in the region, you're gonna suck it up and recruit him to help against the lich queen...keeping a close eye on hm all the while...because your party is simply more effective with him than without him, and you know it.

And as I said, that is a bad thing to do because it takes agency away from those other players.

Rime, my chaotic neutral rogue, often does stupid things. Put a button in her path and she'll push it. The DM loves her because they can guarantee I'll find the plot that way. The other players try to reason with her as to why not to do certain things, and it often works. But the idea of charming her into obediance is anathema to the rest of the party because mind-control is pretty evil. And no, we don't charm NPCs either for exactly that same reason.

We neither see nor flag mind control as evil, and nor does the game as written (in any edition). It's just another tool in the box, and often considerably less harmful to the target than the alternatives, as in:

--- we need to get info from this prisoner now; we can torture him and later kill him, or just kill him now and cast lots of Speak With Deads, or charm him and later let him go.
--- we need to rein in this otherwise-useful guy's gonzo stupidities; we can charm him and keep him around, or we can stand back and watch him kill himself while hoping he doesn't drag the rest of us down with him.
--- we've got this Orc who surrendered to us; we can kill her now, or haul her around as a captive, or charm her and let her help us.

And here you are reducing a PC to a mere tool, rather than as a person.

If I'm in a party and we're considering what new recruits to bring in then yes, I'm approaching it like a sports team manager: who best fits what we need, and-or who best fills the gaps in our current lineup.

Rime isn't in the party because of her skills as a thief, since she has none besides stealth (Int was her dump stat and many rogue skills in 5e are Int-based; she's a swashbuckler, who rely on Dex and Cha); she's part of the party because she is friend and ally to the other characters. We have nobody who can search for traps with any reliability.

Were I in that game I'd have us go out and recruit an NPC Rogue or Thief to fill that gap, along with that of dealing with locks.

Cool that she's a swashbuckler though; I've long thought there's room for a dedicated swashvuckler class in the game but have yet to design it.

We have NPCs with the party because we have befriended them or because they're part of our backstories, not because we hired them for a role.

Some party NPCs come in due to friendship, others for story reasons, and others because they're hired. The party I'm running has at the moment three NPC Orcs working for them - all were enemies who surrendered to the party and got taken in as henches - plus a recruited full-character Thief brought in because they didn't otherwise have any stealth at all, plus an unclassed sex-trade worker (a camp follower of an enemy army) they took prisoner as they didn't know what else to do with her and who has since shown some nascent potential as a future adventurer.

Odds are high to extreme that none of these NPCs will be with the party after this adventure ends, though. The Orcs will be repatriated to their clans, the Thief is long since fed up with this crew and can't wait to leave (and may or may not rip them off on her way out, that's still TBD), and she'll probably end up taking the prisoner with her and try to get her into the Thieving trade.

We've had games where a PC has not been able to become friend and ally to the characters for whatever reason--typically goals or personality too different--and each time, the player had chosen to have PC leave and then made a character who could work with the group. But this is very rare, since we all find a reason to work together.

We've had characters leave parties for similar reasons. We've also had more stubborn characters stay in and keep arguing.

And usually the overriding reason to work together comes down to realizing two things: the whole of a well-rounded party is greater than the sum of its parts, and the "ka-ching" payoff is better.

Yes, they're truly employees. But no, because while the boss can order the secretary around, the secretary's player can choose whether or not they are going to obey, and the secretary's player can have a discussion with the boss's player if the boss is getting out of hand with their demands. Because we understand that things like one PC being abusive to another is as much a player issue as it is a character issue, because it involves a player making the choice to act that way. There's no such thing as "it's what my character would do." Your characters are not separate entities over whom you have no control. If they're jerks, it's because you made them that way.

I greatly prefer that in-character problems and disagreements be solved in-character. The moment it spills over to the table, that's when the real problems begin.

So here, if the boss is being too pushy it's on the secretary to push back in-character, or to go on strike, or to quit the job. No table discussion needed, just play the characters true to themselves and let the chips fall where they may.

But switch from that sort of game. Let's pretend we're talking about game where you're in a chain of command. A military game, or something like Star Trek. The players are still choosing to play in that dynamic. Because it's a group game where the goal is for everyone to have fun, having the captain or commander PC abuse their relationship with the other PCs because they're in charge means that there's a good chance that the other PCs aren't having fun.

A military game is a different animal; and would indeed require some players to be willing to allow other players to, in effect, order their characters around. Most players IME would be fine with this dynamic for the very short term (as in, a one-off game or a very short closed-ended campaign) but none would go for it in anything intended ot be long-term: we're all just too chaotic.

Because they're PCs, and I'm not going to force other players not play their characters. This is what you need to understand, and you seem to refuse to do that.

Which means you're allowing metagame concerns to trump your being true to your character; and while I do understand the motivations and rationale behind this, it's still - along with pretty much any other metagaming - not something I want to see in a game.

 

[pemerton]

It seems to me that if such characters exist in the fiction of the setting, but the character creation rules do not allow us to make them as playable characters, then this might be a wrong rule system to use with this setting.

Kings and dukes exist in many D&D settings, but the PC creation rules don't permit PCs to be these things, with castles and retainers and vast quantities of money.

Insisting that the PC build rules permit, as playable characters, everything we can conceive of in the fiction, is hard to reconcile with D&D-style balance-based game play.

I mean, a game like Cthulhu Dark has no trouble incorporating a PC as a duke, but its resolution framework really has nothing in common with D&D's except that some dice are rolled in both.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

Kings and dukes exist in many D&D settings, but the PC creation rules don't permit PCs to be these things, with castles and retainers and vast quantities of money.

Insisting that the PC build rules permit, as playable characters, everything we can conceive of in the fiction, is hard to reconcile with D&D-style balance-based game play.

I mean, a game like Cthulhu Dark has no trouble incorporating a PC as a duke, but its resolution framework really has nothing in common with D&D's except that some dice are rolled in both.

Apples and oranges. Character creation rules say nothing about whether you're a king or a duke or not. I would think that in most games starting D&D character being one would be unsuitable, but it certainly is an old tradition for a character to eventually become one.

 

[pemerton]

Apples and oranges. Character creation rules say nothing about whether you're a king or a duke or not. I would think that in most games starting D&D character being one would be unsuitable, but it certainly is an old tradition for a character to eventually become one.

AD&D character creation rules have things to say about whether or not a character is a king or duke: a character can't start owning a castle, for instance, nor with the sort of money that would be typical of a king or a duke.

Lots of other FRPGs also deal with this as an aspect of PC creation: noble status might be something that costs points in a point buy system, for instance.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

AD&D character creation rules have things to say about whether or not a character is a king or duke: a character can't start owning a castle, for instance, nor with the sort of money that would be typical of a king or a duke.

Must be an untypical king then! Perhaps one in exile or something. Sounds like a good fodder for adventure.

Lots of other FRPGs also deal with this as an aspect of PC creation: noble status might be something that costs points in a point buy system, for instance.

Yes. But this is not a rule thing in D&D, so your comparison was invalid. Besides, like I already pointed out, it of course is perfectly possible for character to become a king. Point of course never was that every NPC in the setting must be representable by a starting character.

 

[Lanefan]

I think it is fine to do it this way, but I don't see as much on ought here as you do. Classing is a convenient mechanic for making player characters, and can work for NPCs. Most NPCs are going to follow this approach. But I don't think they have to follow all the same character creation parameters a PC does (because the parameters for player characters are about balance). For example, I don't see an issue with simply assigning stats that make sense for the character you are creating.

We agree so far...

I also don't even have a problem with putting a stat above what a PC can roll, if there is an in setting reasons why.

...and here, if that in-setting reason is both a) airtight and b) somehow discoverable by the players if they so desire.

Otherwise, you're wide open to the question: "If that NPC Dwarf Fighter can have a stat that high, why can't my PC Dwarf Fighter have the same?", to which there really is no acceptable answer.

The point pemerton made in the OP, which again disagreed with in many ways, I think makes a very sound point about the need for there to be creativity around this stuff (he is simply arguing that creativity should extend to the players, which in some campaigns, some groups, some games, is going work well). But I am saying, given that my general preference is for games where the players don't have this kind of power to side step the parameters of character creation and premise, it is still very important that the system not then go and also constrain the GM in the act of designing NPCs, adventures, etc. Once in a while the GM needs to make an exceptional halfling NPC, like a Gollum character. And yes the game may have existing paths to achieve something like that, but I think the more creative freedom the GM has to fully realize the concept, the better (for me as long as it isn't a crazy violation of the setting or cosmology, you need that sort of thing).

Here I disagree, in that for consistency reasons I think the GM should be constrained by the established parameters of the setting, just like the players are. And yet this still allows the GM to create a Gollum-like NPC, becasue on examination that NPC is a) fully explainable within the setting's parameters and b) theoretically replicate-able by a PC if the same steps are followed (i.e. be a Hobbit and possess the One Ring for several centuries).

Also there is another point here that is important: ease of use. The GM shouldn't have to generate a fully fleshed out NPC using the class system every time the players meet someone new. It is much easier sometimes to have shorthand for this sort of thing rather than make every NPC have to dot each I and cross every T.

On this we agree, but only if the resultng NPC falls within the roll-able limits for a PC. You don't need everything every time; you just have to know that if you for some reason suddenly do need something, it'll fall within PC-achievable limits.

But why should I have to stick to classing the monster. I often do it, but I don't understand why I can'y completely ignore that in favor of something else that makes sense or saves me time. I get that Strahd did that and it worked well. It is one tool in the toolbox, but I can also just take the vampire stat and say "he is a skilled warrior and magic user so I am going to adjust this and that, increase HP and give him some spells". It is both time consuming to level every monster like this (again that is one of the reasons things like templates really bothered me in 3E---it is additional work) and it constrains that creative aspect to it. Again, I don't see the classes as mapping to real things in the setting. They are broad types meant to make character creation easier and workable. But I always assume there are thieves in the world who don't exactly match a thief who is designed like a PC thief (there has to be, or the world would basically just be a video game)

That's a difference, then: I do see classes as being very real things within the setting. A Magic-User is a Magic-User, distinctive both in- and out-of-game from an Illusionist or a Thief or a Fighter. And thus, if that Vampire is a MU it's going to have a spellbook somewhere*, and the spells it casts are going to work the same as if a PC was casting them. But a lich, for example, who has some spell-like abilities that aren't spells, doesn't need to use the MU mechanics for such. The same is true of a Vampire's innate charming ability; it's not a spell, therefore doesn't need to follow the spellcasting mechanics.

* - a creative way of preventing the PCs from taking home a Vampire's spellbook: instead of being written on paper, the spells be carved into the inside of his coffin and-or into the walls of the chamber said coffin is in. Yes, I can be a nasty DM sometimes.

 

[Lanefan]

I don't really follow this. I mean, what does being "classed" mean in the fiction?

And if there can be "non playable" beings in the world, why can't one of them be (say) a human who is able to cast spells while wearing armour?

Because Human NPCs are bound by the same rules and restrictions as are Human PCs. Otherwise, a player has every right to get annoyed when an NPC can do what his PC cannot when all other things (e.g. species, class, level, and available options) are equal. That said...

Why can't a god bestow on some (non-player) worshipper the ability to do such-and-such unique miraculous thing?

...indeed, this could happen. It would be extremely unusual "one of a kind" stuff, sure; and most importantly would have the benefit of in-fiction explainability behind it.

I'm talking of more general and-or widespread PC/NPC disparities e.g. a blanket rule saying NPCs can cast while in armour but PCs cannot, or vice-versa. That's the sort of thing that blows up in-setting consistency.