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

[AlViking]

Ok, but even if you're ceding all control/authority over teh setting to the GM; does that pre-suppose that the GM is doing maximum prep, or do you just feel best when the world is being steadily narrated to you regardless of what it looks like on the GM side? EG: the GM is free to extrapolate world details and events, but so long as it feels relatively "right" from your side of the screen and your mental image of the world as the GM unfolds it isn't bothered, everything is ok?

I dislike the tone of all these related questions. You aren't the only one or even the most egregious but it's always "ceding all control/authority over the setting" or similar. There's always this undertone of the GM having the power and I'm just a hapless victim of their whims.

If I choose to play softball with my friends, I have no issue that I'm not the pitcher and am instead playing shortstop we all play different positions. I'm not ceding anything, I've chosen to play a specific role in the game. One where I alone control what my character thinks, says and does while the GM controls things other than my character. My character is not controlled by anything other than what we agreed to as a social contract in our session 0 and general civility and cooperation with the group.

I like D&D's approach because it feels more real to me, more like I'm a protagonist in a novel or movie. As long as the world is logical and consistent I really don't care how it comes into being. It could have been invented a year ago or a second ago

 

[Micah Sweet]

Cool!

Can you also accept that for many players, satisfying "uncovering of setting mysteries" and "earned actions" do not require detailed notes and sole-GM authority? That it feels as real to them without any of that? That they love being asked to either establish or embellish parts of their POV ("Painting the Scene" is a technique I rely on a lot to draw character's perceptions of the world out), and this shared ownership is a highlight of our play?

Like, at the end of almost every session of Stonetop my two-lore focused players register that they loved digging in and finding new details about the world or uncovering mysteries (or are frustrated that they just haven't quite gotten there yet, so that's a wish for next time!) - but it's all extrapolation with some occasional exploiting of the setting prep. Often with provocative questions, or a cross-cultural check ("Zel, what did your church down in Lygos teach you about X? Oh ok, cool! Hey Naren, what have you read in books up here in the North about the same thing that's very different?"), and some GM adjudication. And always addressed to the characters, grounding it in their experiences and background and perceptions etc.

Why would anyone not accept that? People like different things. This statement approaches an axiom. You can accept that people like different things and still be allowed to state that you don't like something and why you feel that way.

 

[zakael19]

I dislike the tone of all these related questions. You aren't the only one or even the most egregious but it's always "ceding all control/authority over the setting" or similar. There's always this undertone of the GM having the power and I'm just a hapless victim of their whims.

If I choose to play softball with my friends, I have no issue that I'm not the pitcher and am instead playing shortstop we all play different positions. I'm not ceding anything, I've chosen to play a specific role in the game. One where I alone control what my character thinks, says and does while the GM controls things other than my character. My character is not controlled by anything other than what we agreed to as a social contract in our session 0 and general civility and cooperation with the group.

I like D&D's approach because it feels more real to me, more like I'm a protagonist in a novel or movie. As long as the world is logical and consistent I really don't care how it comes into being. It could have been invented a year ago or a second ago

I mean, there's been examples in D&D published books back over the decades about shared-world building authority and all that, and it comes up a lot in recent "D&D content creator" advice and such (see as a small example: players adding background details and expecting it to be integrated into play). Hence my deliberate use of a word that says "I dont want that, I want the GM to be the sole authority on the world and all my interactions to be questions."

Like, above all else I'm a voracious reader. I've never personally felt more like my moment to moment gameplay was out of a quality fantasy novel then running or playing a Dungeon World descended game (in part because good novels or movies tend to hard scene frame).

 

[Micah Sweet]

When you say "setting independence" do you mean like, avoiding the sort of computer role playing game/module feel of "this situation was static until we walked up" sort of thing? Would a high-GM authority over descriptions version of Blades in the Dark work for you, if you're familiar with the setting descriptions and GM tools therein?

That's a big part of it, yes. And what you're describing might work for me in the short term, although the conflict insistence and character feelings/goals/motivation-centric premise of the entire system would remain not to my taste. I simply don't care for Narrativist-leaning games, particularly when the mechanics enforce that style.

 

[AlViking]

I mean, there's been examples in D&D published books back over the decades about shared-world building authority and all that, and it comes up a lot in recent "D&D content creator" advice and such (see as a small example: players adding background details and expecting it to be integrated into play). Hence my deliberate use of a word that says "I dont want that, I want the GM to be the sole authority on the world and all my interactions to be questions."

Like, above all else I'm a voracious reader. I've never personally felt more like my moment to moment gameplay was out of a quality fantasy novel then running or playing a Dungeon World descended game (in part because good novels or movies tend to hard scene frame).

There's nothing wrong with shared-world building authority I just don't think it's inherently better and the repeated and incessant insistence that it is somehow superior is what I dislike. It's just different. If it works better for you, great.

 

[robertsconley]

Can you also accept that for many players, satisfying "uncovering of setting mysteries" and "earned actions" do not require detailed notes and sole-GM authority? That it feels as real to them without any of that? That they love being asked to either establish or embellish parts of their POV ("Painting the Scene" is a technique I rely on a lot to draw character's perceptions of the world out), and this shared ownership is a highlight of our play?

I’ll be straight with you, I’ll answer your question, but I do want to point out something first. The way it’s phrased feels like it assumes I don’t accept other valid playstyles unless I say so here. That makes it harder to write a clean answer. I’m not upset, but I think it’s important to explain where I’m coming from before continuing.

Can you also accept that for many players, satisfying "uncovering of setting mysteries" and "earned actions" do not require detailed notes and sole-GM authority? That it feels as real to them without any of that? That they love being asked to either establish or embellish parts of their POV ("Painting the Scene" is a technique.

Sure, but focusing on that misses the larger point I was making.

Like, at the end of almost every session of Stonetop my two-lore focused players register that they loved digging in and finding new details about the world or uncovering mysteries (or are frustrated that they just haven't quite gotten there yet, so that's a wish for next time!) - but it's all extrapolation with some occasional exploiting of the setting prep. Often with provocative questions, or a cross-cultural check ("Zel, what did your church down in Lygos teach you about X? Oh ok, cool! Hey Naren, what have you read in books up here in the North about the same thing that's very different?"), and some GM adjudication. And always addressed to the characters, grounding it in their experiences and background and perceptions etc.

I think we’re both successful in producing the same kind of feeling for our players—mystery, weight, discovery, and character engagement. But that doesn’t mean our approaches are the same.

Upthread, I went into detail about how I accomplish this in my Living World sandbox campaigns: how prep, impartial adjudication, a consistent world state, and emergent consequences support that feeling. I also analyzed how Torchbearer accomplishes this differently, like with conflict-driven mechanics.

With your approach, I see the effect you’re describing, but I don’t yet have a clear picture of the process that produces it. If you’ve already laid that out and I missed it, my apologies. But if you walk me through what it is you do, I think we could pinpoint where our methods differ and what the consequences of those differences are, like I did with Torchbearer.

And to touch on your initial comments, I firmly believe that when it comes to creativity, different techniques aren’t inherently good, neutral, or bad, they simply have consequences. If the consequences of a given approach or mechanic strengthen your creative goals, then that’s a success, regardless of the form it takes.

 

[Maxperson]

My take is slightly different:

I read through dozens of posts telling me that <poster X> finds play that uses my preferred approaches unrealistic or artificial and lacking in verisimilitude or whatever. And the poster seems to think that I will find their preference unremarkable, even reasonable.f

But when I say that I find a certain approach too railroad-y, I get told that I'm being unreasonable and misunderstanding the approach and using jargon and . . . etc, etc, etc.

The major difference is that when we say your way is unrealistic to us, we are using realistic how it's commonly used. When you invent a new definition for railroad and then tell us that our way feels railroad-y to you, that's not a reasonable statement, because you are misusing the term railroad.

It's like if I redefine horrendous to mean, "Pemerton's game" instead of what the common definition is, and then go around saying your game is horrendous. Doing that would confuse the hell out of people and would be a misuse of the word horrendous.

It's not reasonable to expect people to accept your redefinitions.

 

[The Firebird]

I gave an actual play example, upthread, from my own play: the PCs oppose NPCs who belong to a particular, powerful faction; the upshot is a scry-teleport-fry attack which is a near-TPK. The players couldn't reasonably know what sorts of consequences might flow from the (completely reasonable, from the point of view of the dynamics of play) decision to make the interesting choice to oppose those NPCs.

Was there no way for the PCs to learn the NPC was a member of a powerful faction? I think scry and die is a reasonable expectation in some worlds when opposing a powerful faction. I think we have to distinguish more clearly between "not known to the players" and "not knowable in any way by the players".

Likewise, a night of carousing having unintended effects is its own trope. It's true they won't know exactly how things will go sideways. But I think it's reasonable to expect partying and throwing around charm spells could have some consequences.

Perhaps the players should take care when charming random NPCs.

 

[The Firebird]

Genuinely curious question: what is it about thinking that a GM is looking at notes about a world / setting / upcoming occurrence that makes it feel like it has more weight to you?

If the GM is making things up as they go, I start to feel like I'm playing the GM, not the world. If I want to succeed, I have to appeal to their sense of what would be fun or interesting moreso than what is good in universe.

If the scenario is fixed, then I get to play the world instead.

 

[Manbearcat]

With your approach, I see the effect you’re describing, but I don’t yet have a clear picture of the process that produces it. If you’ve already laid that out and I missed it, my apologies. But if you walk me through what it is you do, I think we could pinpoint where our methods differ and what the consequences of those differences are, like I did with Torchbearer.

I’m out of town on my phone and I don’t have time to engage with things. However, feel free to look the 3 x 4e PBP games here and the current DW game in NCS. There are other games in the past on here (both 4e and DW) that should do the same work.

1 of those games is No Myth 4e.

The other 3 are:

* Points of Light Nentir Vale.

* Points of Light Nentir Vale.

* Dungeon World played in the contained and conflict-focused (Story Now version of a sandbox similar to Duskvol) Neverwinter Campaign Setting for 4e.

Not a PBP, but one of the players catalogued our Stonetop game (process + effect) in significant detail for an Actual Play post.

Not a PBP, but one of the players played The Judge (who actively catalogues events of Stonetop as their role as town mediator, scribe, and historian) in another game of Stonetop.

These give you, on-hand, transparent reference for how PC build input + setting + situation-framing + gamestate evolution + situation-state evolution inform each other and marry. These should provide the effect + process you’re looking for in exacting detail.

I can’t answer questions or engage further until later next week, but there are several players on these boards who played in these games.

And again, there are other ones from the past. But anyone one of these should do the trick (and we’re purposely played or accounted here to do this trick exactly).