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

[EzekielRaiden]

So I think this is an interesting comment. My take on it is that, with heavily prepped games, the GM is very often reacting to their own creations. Yes, they are including some input from the players… but it’s limited to the actions of their characters. Which are also limited by the GM’s creations.

The game world is a construct, almost entirely of the GM. They then use that as a starting point. They extrapolate from there. That’s a lot of authority over what play will be about.

This. Precisely exactly this.

It's the GM's world. You're just getting the chance to witness it.

 

[pemerton]

The dispute is about whether it allows for meaningful input / control by the players or not.

Is it?

I have talked about degrees of control over the shared fiction. That is what I am analysing. Whether any given degree is "meaningful" or not seems to be a matter of taste. Some people clearly think it is meaningful that the players rather than the GM declare their PCs' actions, although to me that just seems to be a basic description of how conventional RPGing works.

 

[robertsconley]

Then it would be nice if folks on "your side" of this particular discussion would stop doing that to styles you aren't advocating for.

I understand the frustration, and I agree that mischaracterizations from any direction don’t help move the conversation forward. In my experience, both here and at the table, it’s more productive to focus on the substance of ideas rather than the tone or repeated reframing others may bring. When a claim is weak, misinformed, or keeps circling the same ground, that usually becomes clear through scrutiny. Responding only when there’s something genuinely new or substantive to engage with helps avoid giving undue weight to distractions or rhetorical loops.

In the long run, it keeps the discussion clearer, and I think we all benefit from that.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

Well, for the record, I disagree with anyone claiming that every single part of the entire world must be fleshed out in detail prior to play starting. I haven't seen anyone claiming that and, given that no one has a gameworld with millions of independently statted NPCs, updated daily for worldwide births and deaths, I doubt anyone is actually doing that. I would go so far as to suggest that if you took that to be the claim, maybe the post that gave that impression is worth a second read for a less extreme interpretation?

If someone did make that claim at some point in the thread, they don't seem to be still arguing it, so maybe drop that tangent?

But the point--very very specifically, made repeatedly in this thread--is that the world is never created "in response to" the PCs. The specific terms used for this have been "objectivity", "independence"/"independent" (from the PCs and from player preferences), and "extrapolation".

I find none of these terms actually capture much of anything. The objectivity, as I've said, has a far greater focus on preserving a feeling or appearance of objectivity, rather than the actual state thereof--which is perfectly fine, but it means that that "objectivity" is actually a specific form of subjectivity, dependent on the needs and tastes of the players, which has been repeatedly rejected as an unacceptable technique. The "independence" from the players immediately falls apart the moment you start doing things like asking to what degree things get prepared--the prep is, almost exclusively, radiating outward from those places the PCs are at least somewhat likely to go, people the PCs are at least somewhat likely to interact with, and the further away from plausible/expected PC attention, the less prep is done...which is exactly like the approaches used in games being rejected for failing to meet this standard. And then the extrapolation, which fills in the gaps and permits flexible, dynamic response, literally IS what systems like Dungeon World and Burning Wheel are driven by--using our own good sense and reasonable chains of thought, selecting possibilities that are biased toward being interesting in some way (because, as said at length above, a game that preserved anything even remotely like the ratio of interesting:uninteresting situations IRL would be almost entirely suffused with empty, uninteresting stuff!)

In other words, these terms when analyzed closely don't point out any differences!

 

[mamba]

You recognize that the only things that are getting details...are the ones the GM filter is allowing through. Everything else gets blocked out for, I cannot stress this enough, purely subjective reasons.

but what that filter is letting through is influenced by the characters actions (or potentially even the players). If the party goes north, something else filters through than if they go south. If they engage with some random NPC, that NPC comes into focus while the other 50 going about their lives in the scene (market, inn, …) are being ignored

 

[EzekielRaiden]

but what that filter is letting through is influenced by the characters actions (or potentially even the players). If the party goes north, something else filters through than if they go south. If they engage with some random NPC, that NPC comes into focus while the other 50 going about their lives in the scene (market, inn, …) are being ignored

Yes.

Which is prep based on player interest, not based on what the world "objectively" contains.

Which has been repeatedly cited as one of the most important elements here, that it is utterly and completely independent of the PCs. People have brought that up more times than I could count, that this independence is completely central to their approach. But here you specifically say it isn't independent at all--that the world IS generated in response to the players. As Max did earlier, that there wouldn't be any guards or any tower etc. etc. if the players chose to walk a different path.

 

[Maxperson]

Well, I disagree that intent is necessary. I suppose an intentional railroad is worse because the GM is actively denying player choice… but there are plenty of GMs who do so without realizing.

Not enough to make the game a railroad game. It's hard not to know that you are forcing your vision on the players when you do it consistently. I will agree that they may not know it's called a railroad, but they know what they are doing.

I know this because I’ve done my fair share of it. Never with any intention other than providing my players with an engaging experience… but I’ve done it.

And it was actively encouraged at the time in many products and many sources of advice and tips of the period. And that effect still lingers (some would say looms) in the hobby to this day.

So no, I don’t think bad faith is required.

You didn't know that you were forcing your vision on them? I find that hard to believe. I do believe that you were directed to play that way. AD&D was like that. I also believe that you didn't know it was called railroading.

 

[Maxperson]

No sand is literally moved. What happens - literally - is that everyone at the table agrees to imagine <this> rather than <that>.

Do you know understand what a metaphor is? I wasn't saying that sand literally moved.

 

[mamba]

The decision to call for a Steel test is not arbitrary. The rules state when the GM may call for a Steel test, including the starting point of "say 'yes' or roll the dice".

if the rule gives the GM the option to do that at basically any time (the starting point of ‘say yes or roll the dice’, ie every time the player asks something of declares an action, very much sounds like that to me) then it is pretty arbitrary, rule or no rule.

 

[Bedrockgames]

Really?

The players declared that there were guards at the gate? The players declared that the town was there? What, exactly, is the DM reacting to? Yes, the players will react to what the DM puts in front of them, fair enough. DM describes, players react. DM then describes again. Wash, rinse, repeat. That's the basic play loop. At no point is the DM "reacting" to anything. The DM is dictating results. The DM is narrating results. But, at no point is the DM actually reacting to those results.

the players pretty routinely press against the boundaries of what the GM has presented and this takes campaigns in the directions the players are interested in. No, the players don’t have authority to create the guards. Nor do they have authority to create a pie shop. They can probe weather the city has pie shops and actively push the campaign in that direction. They can also actively push the campaign in the direction of criminality. It is up to them. Yes the GM plays the world, but the players push that world and definitely have an active say with what is going on.