NPC Deception/Persuasion and player agency

[Bill Zebub]

You will likely find that the people who find creating builds for their character fun are also the people who enjoy this sort of "mechanical problem-solving" gameplay.

Yeah that makes sense to me.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I feel like you have very carefully responded in such a way as to completely avoid responding to my point.

Likewise, there feels to me like an attempt to semantically evade even addressing your own process of play by simultaneously saying you aren't protecting anyone's story, but you are also making things happen.

Building a world and making events happen in it is a story. It's a plot. It might not have a fixed end you might be flexible and open to different resolutions and wandering paths, but it's still a story you are collaborating in creating.

The players make things happen. Not me. Once things start, I react to them (mostly, existing NPCs continue doing what they were doing until a PC interferes).

 

[soviet]

You will likely find that the people who find creating builds for their character fun are also the people who enjoy this sort of "mechanical problem-solving" gameplay.

This is a factor of game design. Modern D&D is built around players choosing multiple combinations of largely flavourless technical ability packets in a way that's akin to building a Magic deck. It's natural therefore to try to build something that is mechanically effective. It's natural then to focus on how to deploy that effectiveness as optimally as possible during play.

'Why do people at this hammer and nails party keep hammering nails into things?!?'

 

[Bill Zebub]

This is a factor of game design. Modern D&D is built around players choosing multiple combinations of largely flavourless technical ability packets in a way that's akin to building a Magic deck. It's natural therefore to try to build something that is mechanically effective. It's natural then to focus on how to deploy that effectiveness as optimally as possible during play.

'Why do people at this hammer and nails party keep hammering nails into things?!?'

Whereas in Shadowdark you are rolling ability scores straight down the line, and you get random special abilities (based on your class) at odd levels. About the only thing you can pick is your spells, if you are a caster.

The design is such that even if you roll terribly you are still viable at something.

So, yeah, a lot less emotional investment in 'the build'. It took me a while to let that part go, but now I love it.

 

[Aldarc]

This is a factor of game design. Modern D&D is built around players choosing multiple combinations of largely flavourless technical ability packets in a way that's akin to building a Magic deck.

Off-topic, but I have said before that I wish that there was a TTRPG that was created more akin to Magic the Gathering. I'm honestly surprised that WotC never bothered to do so even in the time before they acquired D&D or since. An actual TTRPG built to emulate MtG would be great, much as it was when Guild Wars 1 pretty much did that for video games.

So, yeah, a lot less emotional investment in 'the build'. It took me a while to let that part go, but now I love it.

I don't need a build, but I do need a little more predictability when it comes to my class, so I don't think that I will ever be able to let that go.

 

[soviet]

No, definitely not. It does not have to be 1st person acting.

Maybe this will clarify (using an example from upthread):

1. "If you don't help us I will expose your affair with the Count's daughter to the whole court!"
2. I'll threaten to tell the court about the man's affair if he doesn't help us.
3. Can I roll Persuasion to see if he'll help us?

I'm just saying that I greatly prefer #1 or #2 (and, really, I prefer #2 myself) to #3.

I only really want #1. I guess #2 is OK for non-critical scenes that we don't need to focus on, but only occasionally. Players that can't/won't do at least some of #1 aren't welcome in my game.

 

[soviet]

Off-topic, but I have said before that I wish that there was a TTRPG that was created more akin to Magic the Gathering. I'm honestly surprised that WotC never bothered to do so even in the time before they acquired D&D or since. An actual TTRPG built to emulate MtG would be great, much as it was when Guild Wars 1 pretty much did that for video games.

I'm not sure what you had in mind, but it seems to me that all WotC editions have been modelled after MtG, 4e especially.

 

[Aldarc]

I'm not sure what you had in mind, but it seems to me that all WotC editions have been modelled after MtG, 4e especially.

While I like 4e D&D, I'm not quite sure if that is how I would have modelled MtG as a TTRPG. I think that the problem is that 4e D&D is still D&D and that it is trying to preserve many of its D&Disms for the sake of being a D&D game. I would want something a little more separated from D&D that leaned more heavily into being MtG as a TTRPG.

 

[Micah Sweet]

While I like 4e D&D, I'm not quite sure if that is how I would have modelled MtG as a TTRPG. I think that the problem is that 4e D&D is still D&D and that it is trying to preserve many of its D&Disms for the sake of being a D&D game. I would want something a little more separated from D&D that leaned more heavily into being MtG as a TTRPG.

The irony is that a very common complaint about 4e is that it separated from D&D too much.

 

[payn]

Whereas in Shadowdark you are rolling ability scores straight down the line, and you get random special abilities (based on your class) at odd levels. About the only thing you can pick is your spells, if you are a caster.

The design is such that even if you roll terribly you are still viable at something.

So, yeah, a lot less emotional investment in 'the build'. It took me a while to let that part go, but now I love it.

The build struggle is real. I am a big Traveller fan and I have to work with players all the time on it. Chargen is random, but you can make a lot of informed choices to ensure (generally) the type of character you want. A lot of folks dislike not being able to just pick the things they want and how good they are at them. Even further, they view career paths like D&D class system. A career path is nothing like that. Its simply a background generator and skill delivery system for the character. For example, one player chose the scholar career and became a doctor. He was upset and said the system sucks becasue he couldnt effectively heal in combat (traveller is more heal after the battle mechanically) even though he had a dozen skills to chose from in any give situation. In his mind "doctor" was essentially a D&D cleric.

Diving further into our earlier discussion, D&D has an oversized impression on TTRPGs in general. Especially, the trad/neo-trad approach of a GM role. Some games allow metacurrency to override GM decisions, other games allow a player to temporarily take on the role, and even others share the GM role equally amongst the players. So, symmetry, and more importantly, the expectation of symmetry, is going to vary.