D&D General [rant]The conservatism of D&D fans is exhausting.

[TwoSix]

@Hussar

i might compare 'living world' vaguely to a game like CIV, you're running around passing turns with your units(party) but meanwhile the rest of the world is still taking their turns too, typically unconcerned with what your party is doing, encountering and dealing with all their own random events, Rome angered one of their gods and is dealing with that, Asgard expanded their borders, Atlantis finalized those trade routes with Italy, Paris went to war with those hordes and got overrun, all that living world stuff happened while your guys spent a few weeks in the mountains mapping them for your pal in China.

the world turns, but it doesn't turn around the party.

I do think a lot of what “living world” play is intended to look like resembles simulation games like Civ or the Paradox “grand strategy” games. (With its focus on individual rulers taking actions, Crusader Kings is the most salient example.)

 

[AlViking]

Let me try to clarify then.

The characters were not "just exploring". They were traveling to a specific location to explore that specific location. The only reason they went to that specific location is because the DM deliberately called it out as a place of interest - it has a cool name, it's probably somewhere that would be interesting to go.

That's not exploring. Exploring isn't traveling to a specific destination.

Really? I wasn't just exploring Canyonlands on vacation because I already knew it was there? Because the views I saw, the trails I travelled? I know I wasn't the first one to ever experience them, but it was the first time I had ever experienced them. There is only a infinitesimally tiny fraction of the world outside of places like the deep ocean where I would be the first one there, where there wasn't some sort of label attached to a place.

I may be going to a specific destination on the map but the journey is new to me.

 

[Edgar Ironpelt]

at least theoretically, yes, how would you figure out how corruptible a guard is without trying to bribe them?

An assumption here is that the PC failed to bribe the guard because the guard wasn't corrupt. But that's not the only way to interpret a poor result on a bribery skill check.

Maybe the PC misjudged how corruptible the guard was and offered a bribe that was turned down

Maybe the PC misjudged how corruptible the guard was and declined to offer a bribe that the PC believed would be rejected

Maybe the PC correctly judged the guard, and declined to offer a bribe that would be rejected.

Maybe the PC misjudged the size of the bribe needed.

Maybe the PC misjudged the form the bribe needed to take.

I run "bribery" skill, in whatever form it takes in the game I'm running, as being primarily a "judge whether the NPC is open to a bribe" skill, and only secondarily a "successfully get the NPC to accept the bribe" skill. So a good initial result means "Sure, you can successfully bribe the guard with a Take 10, and this is size of the bribe you'll need to offer" and a poor initial result means "You don't know. You can roll again if you actually offer a bribe, but if you fail again you'll get a negative reaction from the guard."

Now this does leave out "you're falsely confident of your ability to bribe the guard" results, but I'm willing to sacrifice those outside the special case of the guard actively trying to entrap people who might bribe him.

 

[SableWyvern]

Let me try to clarify then.

The characters were not "just exploring". They were traveling to a specific location to explore that specific location. The only reason they went to that specific location is because the DM deliberately called it out as a place of interest - it has a cool name, it's probably somewhere that would be interesting to go.

That's not exploring. Exploring isn't traveling to a specific destination.

Sure, travelling somewhere with the intent to explore that place when you get there, is travelling. That is the most tautological of tautologies and is not in dispute. But that doesn't seem to have anything to do with what was originally being discussed, which is whether or not exploration can be an ends in itself.

If anything, it seems to me that you are now proving the point you were trying to argue against. The travelling in this case is just something that takes you to the goal, and the goal is the exploration of the place you're travelling to.

 

[The Firebird]

If the setting is unrealistic, then I don't understand how the heuristic extrapolate what is the most realistic/plausible is supposed to be applied.

It's what is realistic according to the internal logic of the setting. If the Millennium Falcon is being chased by Star destroyers and has sufficient time to charge its (working) hyperdrive, it will make the jump to light speed. That isn't 'realistic', but it is realistic within setting.

 

[AlViking]

An assumption here is that the PC failed to bribe the guard because the guard wasn't corrupt. But that's not the only way to interpret a poor result on a bribery skill check.

Maybe the PC misjudged how corruptible the guard was and offered a bribe that was turned down

Maybe the PC misjudged how corruptible the guard was and declined to offer a bribe that the PC believed would be rejected

Maybe the PC correctly judged the guard, and declined to offer a bribe that would be rejected.

Maybe the PC misjudged the size of the bribe needed.

Maybe the PC misjudged the form the bribe needed to take.

I run "bribery" skill, in whatever form it takes in the game I'm running, as being primarily a "judge whether the NPC is open to a bribe" skill, and only secondarily a "successfully get the NPC to accept the bribe" skill. So a good initial result means "Sure, you can successfully bribe the guard with a Take 10, and this is size of the bribe you'll need to offer" and a poor initial result means "You don't know. You can roll again if you actually offer a bribe, but if you fail again you'll get a negative reaction from the guard."

Now this does leave out "you're falsely confident of your ability to bribe the guard" results, but I'm willing to sacrifice those outside the special case of the guard actively trying to entrap people who might bribe him.

In D&D if you want to bribe a guard there are several things you can do to determine if it's possible. There's info gathering ahead of time of course. There are more immediate things you can do. But how you approach it really depends on how the group wants to handle it. It can be all RP, it could be an insight to get a feel for the guard or some kind of knowledge check to see what your character knows that would be appropriate. Follow that up with perhaps a persuasion check.

I would likely do a mix of RP and relevant skill checks. I would pretty much always give players a chance to have a hint as to possible success but that's kind of up to the players. If they just walk up to a guard before I even complete my description of the location and say "Let me in and I'll give you 10 GP" they likely have no idea. But most of the time they'll at least have a chance to get a clue.

 

[AlViking]

It's what is realistic according to the internal logic of the setting. If the Millennium Falcon is being chased by Star destroyers and has sufficient time to charge its (working) hyperdrive, it will make the jump to light speed. That isn't 'realistic', but it is realistic within setting.

To me realistic means logically consistent with how the world works. Whether that world is Star Wars, Star Trek, Toon World or The Forgotten Realms, most people who are fans of those worlds will know the logical underpinnings of how they work. A GM will typically have a better idea, even when something happens that doesn't seem realistic for that fiction.

 

[Faolyn]

I think another feature, which is brought out in your example, is that the default starting point for a certain sort of sandbox is low stakes player decision-making. Play begins with the players in a position where they need to acquire information, and they do that by making low stakes action declarations that will prompt the GM to reveal that information.

In Gygax's PHB advice on Successful Adventures, he draw an express contrast between player goals of obtaining information, and - once that information is obtained - the different, and higher stakes goal, of acquiring a particular loot, perhaps by targeting a particular dungeon denizen.

Here's a scenario that also starts in a room, with decisions to be made - but they're not low-stakes! Burning Wheel The Sword Demo Adventure PDF

When players sit down with me to play this demo, I give them the following preamble:​

​

You’ve journeyed long through this crumbling, ancient citadel, down through ruined chambers into muck-filled tubes. You arrive, at last, in the wreckage of this collapsed temple. Laying on the shattered altar, in the chamber before you, is that which you seek: The sword!​

​

After the preamble, I lay out the characters and describe each one in brief. After the players have chosen their characters, I instruct them to read their Beliefs. Then I simply ask, “Who gets the sword?”​

​

Mayhem ensues, and suddenly we’ve got game. . . .​

​

I’ve found it useful to start the scene with the whole group in the doorway to the chamber - still in the tunnel, really. The Roden, if he’s in play, should always be in the lead.​

Here are some of the Beliefs:

The Dwarven adventurer: This sword was a treasure of my clan for generations, stolen by foul Roden and abandoned here. I’ll restore it to its rightful place among my people.​

​

The Elven bard: This sword was made by my father. Using its markings, I will demonstrate its origin to my companions so they cannot dispute its ownership.​

​

The human gambler: Master Kogan of the gambling house is going to break my knees if I don’t pay off my debts. I’ve got to get paid in this venture! and also I was the one who figured out where this treasure was; it belongs to me!​

​

The Roden cultist: To enter the Fields of Paradise, I must present my Visionary with this fabled sword.​

These players have options as to which path to follow. They can cooperate, argue, fight, try to betray one another, etc. But I don't think it has the character of a sandbox.

If this is the basis for a short adventure that's deliberately based around a specific idea, it's fine. If this is intended to be the start of a longer campaign, I'd say it's quite railroad-y. Of course, having pre-gen characters built entirely around competition for the same object doesn't help.

 

[The Firebird]

Well, on a success there is no adjudication: the task succeeds, and the intent is realised. The GM can embellish.

But there must be someone adjudicating the world, right? If the intent is to find a ship captain and they succeed, who describes the NPC? Who decides how large the ship is and what the fee will be?

I appreciate your description of the mechanics you had in mind which followed. But I think it is getting into the weeds of system, and doesn't for me explain the salient point: why do you think the fixed world sandbox can be railroading, but player driven is not? I don't think this requires a detailed explanation of how tests are made to be answered.

The first may or may not be part of railroading - again, without more context it's hard to tell. Eg how do the players come to know what the ship-hiring options are? how is the reaction of the captain to their offer determined? Suppose that the GM has the captain say "Yes, I can take you to <place>, but only via <other place where the GM's living world will make some other stuff salient>." Now the play - time spent at the table, fiction being jointly created, etc - is going to be about this GM-driven stuff. That looks a bit railroad-y to me.

Whether the second is railroading also depends a bit on what is going on. If this is really just a bit of colour narration on the way to framing the scene where the PCs arrive at <place>, then I don't see the railroad. It's just embellishment. Conversely, if the whole session is spent engaging with this improvised content the GM has created, that sounds pretty railroad-y.

I also appreciate your attempt to bring nuance to these scenarios. But again I fear that it is over complicating the analysis and I still don't have a good understanding of what precisely you think is railroading. At the moment it seems to me like a "I know it when I see it" standard. And maybe that is the extent of it.

If that isn't the extent of it, what is the minimal working example to your mind that illustrates it? Can it be captured in a sentence or two? E.g., "If the party wants to head east but the GM comes up with unrealistic barriers which prevent their action then it is railroading".

I feel I've seen a lot about specific mechanics, but little about the general principals that make them better or worse (in your view) for these purposes.

 

[Campbell]

But there must be someone adjudicating the world, right? If the intent is to find a ship captain and they succeed, who describes the NPC? Who decides how large the ship is and what the fee will be?

The GM is describing and bringing the ship captain to life, but they are not doing so as an adjudicator. They are framing - authoring details about the world that are further designed to test and provoke the beliefs of the player characters. It's a creative rather than evaluative act. It's constrained by things like plausibility, but the job is to keep the game focused on the belief statements established when characters are made and to frame compelling scenes / decision points for players related to their characters' beliefs.