Dungeons & Dragons Has Done Away With the Adventuring Day

Adventuring days are no more, at least not in the 2024 Dungeon Master's Guide. The new 2024 Dungeon Master's Guide contains a streamlined guide to combat encounter planning, with a simplified set of instructions on how to build an appropriate encounter for any set of characters. The new rules are pretty basic - the DM determines an XP budget based on the difficulty level they're aiming for (with choices of low, moderate, or high, which is a change from the 2014 Dungeon Master's Guide) and the level of the characters in a party. They then spend that budget on creatures to actually craft the encounter. Missing from the 2024 encounter building is applying an encounter multiplier based on the number of creatures and the number of party members, although the book still warns that more creatures adds the potential for more complications as an encounter is playing out.

What's really interesting about the new encounter building rules in the 2024 Dungeon Master's Guide is that there's no longer any mention of the "adventuring day," nor is there any recommendation about how many encounters players should have in between long rests. The 2014 Dungeon Master's Guide contained a recommendation that players should have 6 to 8 medium or hard encounters per adventuring day. The 2024 Dungeon Master's Guide instead opts to discuss encounter pace and how to balance player desire to take frequent Short Rests with ratcheting up tension within the adventure.

The 6-8 encounters per day guideline was always controversial and at least in my experience rarely followed even in official D&D adventures. The new 2024 encounter building guidelines are not only more streamlined, but they also seem to embrace a more common sense approach to DM prep and planning.

The 2024 Dungeon Master's Guide for Dungeons & Dragons will be released on November 12th.

 

[pemerton]

Right. So you exercised the power everyone has agreed the players have: to leave the game if it is not for your liking.

That's a mis-description.

We didn't "leave the game". The game ended. So the GM did not have the absolute power to dictate the fiction that some in this thread are asserting. The GM attempted to create a fiction in which the Kobold was not cognitively capable of answering the questions put by the PCs, and failed in that attempt.

Though one would hope that the actual reason was not that the GM had the temerity to change the kobolds to be different than MM would suggest, but the GM seemingly using that power to thwart the perfectly sensible plan of the PCs.

That seems like a fairly major overreaction. How do you know that was not a particularly dumb kobold that was captured? Or a particularly smart one who was pretending to be dumb to avoid giving out information under interrogation?

Of course, the most likely explanation was that the inexperienced DM had not thought through the answers to your questions. The kobold didn’t know because the DM didn’t know.

I find it interesting that, when examples are presented of players not accepting the GM's proffered fiction, it is the players who are criticised. The GM could easily enough have accepted the players' view of what interrogating a Kobold would be like. And then the game may not have ended!

 

[Crimson Longinus]

That's a mis-description.

We didn't "leave the game". The game ended. So the GM did not have the absolute power to dictate the fiction that some in this thread are asserting. The GM attempted to create a fiction in which the Kobold was not cognitively capable of answering the questions put by the PCs, and failed in that attempt.

The GM dictated the fiction, the players didn't like it and left. Just like everyone has said it could go. The game ended, because all the players left. If it had been just you, it probably would have continued. And that indeed is the veto the players have, which is the de facto limit for the GMs de jure power over the game. They can run it however they want, but if they run it in way the players do not like, they soon will have no players and no game.

I find it interesting that, when examples are presented of players not accepting the GM's proffered fiction, it is the players who are criticised. The GM could easily enough have accepted the players' view of what interrogating a Kobold would be like. And then the game may not have ended!

I was not criticising, at least not unconditionally. There are good and bad reasons to reject what the GM suggests. I assumed you had a good one, which the scenario certainly implied, even though you did not outright state it.

 

[pemerton]

Yes, I am making assumptions. I assume that if there is no DM there is no game.

<snip>

What, exactly is a player going to do if I don't want to DM for them? Chain me down to my chair?

All this applies equally to players. There is no game without players. And what is a GM going to do, if the players aren't interested in the GM's proffered fiction? Chain them down to their chairs?

There is no asymmetry here.

I am following the assumptions as defined by the game I've been playing for close to half a century now that the DM makes the final call and it's worked just fine.

I believe I have been playing D&D for as long as you have. You don't have a monopoly on what makes the game what it is.

What happens if the DM says "No" and the player disagrees?

The same as happens if a player says "no" and the GM disagrees. What that is will obviously depend very much on the circumstances and details of the matter at hand. Generally I like to try and reason things out.

Take the current discussion about whether a thief can use fast hands to cast a spell off a scroll as a bonus action if the spell normally takes an action. As DM I say "No", a player says "Yes". There's no compromise here either it works or it doesn't. There is no compromise, no in-between, as DM I've thought about it and it's not going to happen.

Assuming that your position is well-reasoned, and that the player is rational, then you should be reasonably confident that you can change their mind.

It's not as if this is an ineffable matter; it's a question of balance in the action economy. So the arguments shouldn't be that complicated.

What happens next? Because someone has to decide. The DM can make the final call, the player can make the final call, you can put it to a vote.

Or one person can persuade the others, via reasoned argument.

 

[Oofta]

Nnnnnnope. But isn't it funny how when you guys get people describing your position, it's this horrible affront, putting words in your mouth or thoughts in your head. But when you do it to me, it's perfectly acceptable.

Pretty funny, innit? Just friggin' hilarious.


False dichotomy: you assert that the only possible options are an absolute dictator, or the phrase "X by committee," which specifically means the pejorative of people squabbling and producing a crappy, awful result (usually a "design" but it can be anything, legislating, etc.) Collaboration has more possible options than "X by committee."


This argument only works if the tool itself has no inherent moral or ethical aspect to its use.

A sword is a tool of violence. Its only designed function is to kill, and it is specifically designed to kill human beings. You can use it to kill for good reasons, or for mediocre reasons, or for bad reasons. But because it is designed to kill, it is reasonable to set limits for its use.

"Power over others" is a tool of coercion. That's...literally what power over others is; the ability to force them to agree with you. And coercion, like physical violence, is something reasonably subject to limitations.


But you don't need absolute power to do any of the things you just described. You never, ever have.

So the only possible thing it could be enabling that you couldn't get some other way IS the ability to bash players over the head. That's my point.

I'll ask again. The DM says X, the player says Y. What's the compromise?

Easy example is the question that's been bandied about lately. Some people say you can cast a spell off a scroll as a bonus action using thief's fast hands, other says you can't. As a DM I say you can't, the player says they can. There is no compromise. What happens?

Because that's what we're talking about. Making rulings and establishing lore not directly controlled by the PC.

 

[Oofta]

All this applies equally to players. There is no game without players. And what is a GM going to do, if the players aren't interested in the GM's proffered fiction? Chain them down to their chairs?

It's up to every individual to decide if the game is for them.

There is no asymmetry here.


I believe I have been playing D&D for as long as you have. You don't have a monopoly on what makes the game what it is.

Never said I did. I said I'm following the rules on how the game is run.

The same as happens if a player says "no" and the GM disagrees. What that is will obviously depend very much on the circumstances and details of the matter at hand. Generally I like to try and reason things out.

Assuming that your position is well-reasoned, and that the player is rational, then you should be reasonably confident that you can change their mind.

It's not as if this is an ineffable matter; it's a question of balance in the action economy. So the arguments shouldn't be that complicated.

Or one person can persuade the others, via reasoned argument.

Aren't you the one who keeps insisting that as a DM I have no power over the players? I have no control over what they think or why. If I've thought about something like fast hands and scrolls and made a decision, barring errata, I'm not going to change my mind. I won't reiterate my logic from the other thread but as far as I'm concerned it doesn't work.

So if the player insists it does work and refuses to accept the DM's answer, what happens? Because I know what would happen at my table even if I can't imagine this scenario happening in real life. If they refuse to follow my ruling I will let them know I'm going to skip their turn and go to the next player.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

I find it interesting that, when examples are presented of players not accepting the GM's proffered fiction, it is the players who are criticised. The GM could easily enough have accepted the players' view of what interrogating a Kobold would be like. And then the game may not have ended!

No one is suggesting that the DM could not have handled it better, only that your reaction was disproportionate.

But the DM could not have given you the information that you were demanding if they did not know it themselves. Maybe they could have come up with a more convincing in game reason for not having the information at hand, but “dumb kobold” is a common stereotype in D&D novels and computer games.

I once had a player who knew a huge amount about forensics interrogating me about the state of a corpse they had found. I had to throw up my hands and explain I didn’t know the answers to their questions.

You could have let is pass, and given the inexperienced DM some constructive feedback at the end of the session. As it is, the traumatised DM probably never played again and therefore never learned to be a good DM.

 

[clearstream]

Yes, I am making assumptions. I assume that if there is no DM there is no game.

That's a fair summary of the mental model I sketched upthread as "DM == game".

I've argued that seeing as the game's function and success relies on the imaginations of every participant (not just DM), the game is a shared property. To show that, simply picture DM sitting alone at the table... there is in that case no game. Ergo, DM alone does not possess "the game".

 

[Mort]

My point was that people call their own style "Viking Hat" DMing.

The phrase wasn't one I think people today would generally want to associate themselves with, despite having been used by a proponent of that..."style."

The poster, in that example, was almost certainly engaging in some kind of Internet tough guy power fantasy rather than relaying any kind of actually happened scenario. If the scenario was, in any way, accurate, then his players (if he actually has any) should be reporting him to the proper authorities.

But that doesn't change the fact that 5e (or 3e in that example) has absolutely no way for players to, in game, put controls on the DMs actions.

 

[Emerikol]

That's a fair summary of the mental model I sketched upthread as "DM == game".

I've argued that seeing as the game's function and success relies on the imaginations of every participant (not just DM), the game is a shared property. To show that, simply picture DM sitting alone at the table... there is in that case no game. Ergo, DM alone does not possess "the game".

Let's suppose the DM has an ongoing campaign like Gygax did where people come and go. The game is the DMs. It is Gygax's game. If a player leaves or all the players leave, Gygax will just bring in more players to that same game. It's the same campaign world. If the players go and buy the Greyhawk setting and one of them runs a game, that game is never the same game that Gygax was running. It's a new game based on the new DM.

 

[Oofta]

That's a fair summary of the mental model I sketched upthread as "DM == game".

I've argued that seeing as the game's function and success relies on the imaginations of every participant (not just DM), the game is a shared property. To show that, simply picture DM sitting alone at the table... there is in that case no game. Ergo, DM alone does not possess "the game".

It is a collaborative effort. But any given player can leave and the campaign continues. If the DM leaves, it doesn't.

We've been talking extremes here. As described by the rules of the game, in the games that I've played and run the DM is responsible for the campaign world, it's inhabitants, and what happens in response to what the PCs say and do. Barring outside control of the PC's mental faculties, the player is responsible for what the PCs say and do. So of course the fiction is shared but there are limits on both sides of the DM's screen on who controls what.

As far as rules, there has to be some process for how the final decision is made. At home, if we're playing a card game it's Hoyle's Book of Rules. If we still can't agree it's who bought the deck of cards. In some other RPGs the GM and players have some other controlling factors such as tokens, points or some other agreed upon construct. In D&D it's the DM's job to make the final call on the rules.