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

[SableWyvern]

How does one establish that players know this? Or, to phrase that somewhat differently (but IMO equivalently), what steps do player and DM alike need to take in order for this to be, as you say, "explicitly because" they know. It can't be explicit if it isn't spoken/written/etc., but every single person in this conversation has leaned almost exclusively on the implicit, the unspoken, the "social contract", all of the things that are never said and never will be said.

My players know me, generally. They know that our group, in general, involves taking the mickey out of each other as necessary and not taking silly things too seriously. They're not shy about speaking up, and have learned I am OK with feedack. Or, they are shy, but they've seen others speak up and learned it's OK. Or they've seen me actively ask for feedback.

Our newest player is a work colleague. We just had a meeting earlier today, where I challenged him on some things. He agreed to some of my points, and pushed back against others. When it comes to the game, so far he has been a little more circumspect right now because he's a newbie with only a little experience in a new group of experienced players, but I already knew when inviting him to the group that he and I are capable of engaging in a robust conversation without either of us taking offence. I have no doubt that as he gets more comfortable, he'll be more than capable of speaking up for himself.

I gave him a basic run down about how our table operates, what is expected, what our attitudes are, what the type of game will be, prior to play. It is true that I didn't tell him, "You should speak up if you think I have made a bad ruling," but I absolutely do expect him to work out on his own that he can do this.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

My players know me, generally. They know that our group, in general, involves taking the mickey out of each other as necessary and not taking silly things too seriously. They're not shy about speaking up, and have learned I am OK with feedack. Or, they are shy, but they've seen others speak up and learned it's OK. Or they've seen me actively ask for feedback.

Our newest player is a work colleague. We just had a meeting earlier today, where I challenged him on some things. He agreed to some of my points, and pushed back against others. When it comes to the game, so far he has been a little more circumspect right now because he's a newbie with only a little experience in a new group of experienced players, but I already knew when inviting him to the group that he and I are capable of engaging in a robust conversation without either of us taking offence. I have no doubt that as he gets more comfortable, he'll be more than capable of speaking up for himself.

I gave him a basic run down about how our table operates, what is expected, what our attitudes are, what the type of game will be, prior to play. It is true that I didn't tell him, "You should speak up if you think I have made a bad ruling," but I absolutely do expect him to work out on his own that he can do this.

Okay. I think it's...extraordinarily important to call things out clearly, in spoken/written words, rather than leaving things implicit, for a variety of reasons. (This extends far, far beyond gaming. I always make sure to tell my loved ones that I love them, and to be clear and forthright with my friends, because it is so, so, so easy to think "pshaw, he knows" and only realize ten years later that you haven't said "I love you" in forever.) In relationships, just as in fantasy, words have meaning and names have power. This is one (of several) reasons why I am leery of things that start off by putting everything, or near to it, in the black box; that respond to concerns with "you just gotta trust me/them"; that presume tacit communication, rather than expecting that open communication is needed; that see trust as both inherent-and-automatic, and as a hard, utter binary where it's either flawless or completely f...ouled up and ne'er the twain shall meet.

But this also brings up some really important aspects:

• Every DM that practices this style has to "be OK with feedback". A lot of the things I see...don't reflect being okay with feedback. They instead reflect...well, "my way or the highway". And yes, I have had someone here on ENWorld agree that that described their approach, so this isn't me inventing something out of the blue.
• Every DM that practices this style either needs to be really, really open and direct and forthright (to a degree I don't normally see from anybody!), or they need to be particularly accepting of unexpected breakdown of social conventions...which, well, social conventions are most apt to break down when there's disagreement!
• No player attempting to play in this style can be particularly shy. Shyness is a hard problem here, because it shuts down the communications pipeline and makes feedback extremely difficult. It also makes departing extremely difficult, since doing so is...pretty clearly a burnt bridge in most cases, and certainly most shy people would see it as such.
• Every player needs to give an awful lot of trust with...well, being perfectly honest, not much given in return except the pinky-swear promise of good results. Again, understand that I don't see trust as a hard binary the way you do, where it's either pretty much near-complete and entirely robust, or it's totally broken and nothing remains.
• I don't see many, if any, useful tools for pushing things back toward the super-high-trust end if something ever goes wrong (and, IME, something always goes wrong, that's the nature of human existence, we aren't perfect)...but a lot of ways for that trust to erode once the erosion gets started, even if the erosion started because of an accident, a mistake, etc. through no ill will or even any particularly bad act on anyone's part.
• A lot of stuff, like a lot of really foundational stuff, is just...never discussed. At all. Things aren't explicit. People have to figure out for themselves that they can speak up. People have to figure out for themselves whether or not this DM is amenable, whether or not that DM is consistent. That sort of thing is slow and difficult. By the time you know either way, you're already deeply invested and there's a steep social cost to cutting ties and running. (I would know...I've broken off relationships with others when I realized they weren't healthy, and man, the social cost was NOT fun. At ALL.)

Which...well, I mean, that's sort of the points I've been making all along, just encapsulated more neatly.

 

[SableWyvern]

Okay. I think it's...extraordinarily important to call things out clearly, in spoken/written words, rather than leaving things implicit, for a variety of reasons. (This extends far, far beyond gaming. I always make sure to tell my loved ones that I love them, and to be clear and forthright with my friends, because it is so, so, so easy to think "pshaw, he knows" and only realize ten years later that you haven't said "I love you" in forever.) In relationships, just as in fantasy, words have meaning and names have power. This is one (of several) reasons why I am leery of things that start off by putting everything, or near to it, in the black box; that respond to concerns with "you just gotta trust me/them"; that presume tacit communication, rather than expecting that open communication is needed; that see trust as both inherent-and-automatic, and as a hard, utter binary where it's either flawless or completely f...ouled up and ne'er the twain shall meet.

The way I'm been doing it has been working fine for 40-odd years, so I'm confident the things that need saying are said and anything things left unsaid doesn't need saying.

• Every DM that practices this style has to "be OK with feedback"

Yes, absolutely.

• . A lot of the things I see...don't reflect being okay with feedback. They instead reflect...well, "my way or the highway". And yes, I have had someone here on ENWorld agree that that described their approach, so this isn't me inventing something out of the blue.

I think there is some nuance you've missed then. Sometimes a decision needs to be made, and the GM is the one given the power to make it (disclaimer: under this system of play). If the GM feels the need to lay down the law, it's accepted it's for a good reason and one of the reasons it's accepted is because when it isn't necessary, the discussion is allowed to happen.

• Every DM that practices this style either needs to be really, really open and direct and forthright (to a degree I don't normally see from anybody!), or they need to be particularly accepting of unexpected breakdown of social conventions...which, well, social conventions are most apt to break down when there's disagreement!

I am very forthright in all aspects of my life, as are most of the members of our group in general.

• No player attempting to play in this style can be particularly shy. Shyness is a hard problem here, because it shuts down the communications pipeline and makes feedback extremely difficult. It also makes departing extremely difficult, since doing so is...pretty clearly a burnt bridge in most cases, and certainly most shy people would see it as such.

It's absolutely possible to be shy. It's just difficult to both be shy and hold strong opinions about how the game should be run. But I think this goes for any situation. If you want to have a say in how things go, it always helps if you're willing to voice your opinion.

• Every player needs to give an awful lot of trust with...well, being perfectly honest, not much given in return except the pinky-swear promise of good results. Again, understand that I don't see trust as a hard binary the way you do, where it's either pretty much near-complete and entirely robust, or it's totally broken and nothing remains.

It's a game, played for fun. Good fun is all there is to be gained. Just like there is nothing really to be lost, other than some time. Anyone coming to my table with the expectation that they are being offered anything more than a fun game is going to be very disappointed.

Also, I absolutely do not promise good results, if good means, "you will have fun". I can't guarantee that any given individual will enjoy my games. I know for a fact that some people don't enjoy at least some of my games. I'm not here to please everyone.

• I don't see many, if any, useful tools for pushing things back toward the super-high-trust end if something ever goes wrong (and, IME, something always goes wrong, that's the nature of human existence, we aren't perfect)...but a lot of ways for that trust to erode once the erosion gets started, even if the erosion started because of an accident, a mistake, etc. through no ill will or even any particularly bad act on anyone's part.

I've been at this for 40 years; well over 20 with the same core of players, and I'm not seeing any issues with erosion of trust or things going wrong. (Edit: And the tool that prevents it from eroding is, I'm pretty sure, communication.)

• A lot of stuff, like a lot of really foundational stuff, is just...never discussed. At all. Things aren't explicit. People have to figure out for themselves that they can speak up. People have to figure out for themselves whether or not this DM is amenable, whether or not that DM is consistent. That sort of thing is slow and difficult. By the time you know either way, you're already deeply invested and there's a steep social cost to cutting ties and running. (I would know...I've broken off relationships with others when I realized they weren't healthy, and man, the social cost was NOT fun. At ALL.)

I, and others, have been stressing communication (we keep saying, "talk about it"). Good, open communications are absolutely the foundation of a successful game, as far as I'm concerned. And, as I've mentioned, if you've been invited to my group, an existing member has already identified that you are a good fit.

Which...well, I mean, that's sort of the points I've been making all along, just encapsulated more neatly.

It seems pretty clear that you're not a fan of the way I run games, and might not have fun at my table. I mean, you might find that the issues you've imagined don't actually come up and that it's easy to have a great time, but if you're constantly worried about what's going on behind the scenes, it probably would be stressful and unfun for you. Certainly, if the entire playstyle is not what you're looking for in a game and you feel as if my style of play inhibits your agency, it's unlikely you'll have a good time, communication or not, because I'm simply not offering what you're looking for. And that's OK, because there are plenty of people out there who don't run games the same way I do, and I presume some of them are more to your liking.

I've said this several times and I'll say it again -- all I'm talking about is how I run games and what I have found works well for me.

 

[Lanefan]

The result being turtling behavior. If every time you act in any way that's not totally safe there's a 1% chance of being completely hosed, most players will rapidly, and correctly, conclude that sitting tight is the best policy. After all, rolling up Snardly XII is not that exciting...

...until Snardly XII succeeds where all before him have failed, and goes on to become a superstar...

 

[Lanefan]

Have you ever tried showing people what talking to them would look like?

And to me this is pretending that the issue is dramatically less serious than it really is.

OSR-type gamers are actively antagonistic to the idea that rules are useful. I've seen it over and over again, here and elsewhere.

Not all of us.

Many rules for many things are very useful indeed. It's just the unnecessary rules (in which bucket fall nearly all social-interaction rules IMO) that have to go.

In many ways, my game probably has more and tighter rules than, say, 5e for a lot of things; mostly due to 40-odd years of accumulated rulings and precedents.

 

[Lanefan]

I mean, every collection of people greater than two "contains multitudes" in most instances. I'm just calling out the overall pattern I see.

"Rulings not rules" has been taken as gospel truth. Rules are viewed as nasty bad things. Never add them ever. Check the ones you have to see how many you can just axe completely. Any you can't, gut them until they barely function, and then ignore them.

The very idea that following the rules as they're actually written could even potentially lead to better results than constantly winging it and (re(re(re(re))))inventing the wheel every single time, is rejected out of hand unless and until you give it a spirited defense, and even then, the most you'll get is a begrudging "well I guess on EXCEEDINGLY RARE occasions it MIGHT be POSSIBLE that following written rules could, maybe, be just a little useful". And then the whole process starts again in the next thread...or, more commonly, with the next three posters who join a hundred posts later and now you have to completely re-litigate the entire foundation, lather, rinse, repeat 20 times until the thread gets locked for never going anywhere.

I genuinely do not consider this an exaggeration. I genuinely do not consider this to be misrepresenting the stances I see on this forum damn near all the time.

The nearest a D&D edition has come to (trying for) having a rule for everything was 3.xe. History tells us that was probably overkill; 4e didn't back off this idea far enough, which led to 5e and its rulings-not-rules mantra.

And while rulings-not-rules is a fine way to allow DMs to make rulings that suit their particular tables, those rulings IMO have to be consistent with themselves within each campaign. In other words, each DM's rulings become that table's rules; and yes this means each table plays the game a bit differently than the next much like - if nowhere near as variable as - the kitbash-happy 1e days. I fail to see a problem with this.

 

[Lanefan]

The notes are a minority. Game play, the world description, the rules, prior game history, etc. will inform the players on how things should most likely go. The players have most of the information already.

Let's be...erm...realistic here for a moment: the players have access to most of the information already. Whether they actually read and-or remember much of it is another question entirely.

 

[Lanefan]

-Hey GM why'd you make this ruling?

-I don't need any spoilers to tell you--I decided the cliff was that way because X.

-Hmm, but that seems inconsistent with your previous cliff ruling. How are they going to work in the future?

Then the GM says:

1) you're right, I screwed it up. Thanks, I'll do better I'm the future.

2) no, it's different because Y. That's why I made that decision.

It's if-when the GM says...

3) Oh, I dunno - <shrug> - I'll make something up at the time depending what I feel like.

...that the red flags fly and the feet start looking for the door.

 

[pemerton]

No, not even slightly. Because you're continuing to misunderstand what player agency means.

I don't think I'm misunderstanding at all. My view have been consistent at least back to March 2018 - see, eg this post. And my posts in this thread are basically consistent with the idea of player agency set out in this quite recent thread: An examination of player agency

The bolded words in green are the difference between AW and BW: In AW, nobody is telling you that your character doesn't want to attack or doesn't have the nerves to act under fire. It doesn't always go well, but read the full text of the move, starting on page 136:


A 7-9 is a success. It's not a failure. It's not a perfect success, since you might take harm or get put into a bad position, but it's still a success. Also you choose when you're going to Act Under Fire, because you choose to act in a way that triggers that move. And the MC can't say "you just stand there drooling" (one of the options for a failed Steel test in BW) on a 7-9--or even on an actual failure of 6 or less. Instead, you do what you set out to do, but also take a consequence.

On a miss - a result of 6-down - the GM is allowed to make as hard and direct a move as they like. I posted an example of what that can look like in the post you replied to - "You’re looking out your (barred, 4th-story) window as though it were an escape route" is the PC "standing and drooling". (Also, in BW, it is the player who chooses the hesitation result; but that seems secondary in this context.)

Same thing with using a move to seduce or manipulate someone. You, the player, act it out. You choose when you're using the move. Nobody else can force you to roll the dice and miss your turn because they feel you should.

So don't try to claim they're comparable. Because they're not.

Of course they are. If my AW PC is a victim of manipulation, and ignores it and thus has to act under fire, and fails, then the GM can make as hard and direct a move as they like. This could include narrating my hesitation, and hence something going wrong.

In BW, another player can decide that you need to test your Steel

No they can't. I already posted the rule (p 361): "GMs call for Steel tests."

if you fail, you can't act. You don't succeed at a cost (you said that was against BW philosophy, or words to that affect) and you can't do anything for several rounds.

BW doesn't use rounds. Hesitation is measured in "actions" - what that corresponds to in the fiction, and at the table, is discussed in detail across multiple different parts of the system. In the actual play example that I provided, Aedhros hesitated for 4 actions, which - handily for Alicia, who didn't want Aedhros to murder the innkeeper - was just enough time for her to cast Persuasion. At the table, this is a modest number of sentences and dice rolls: the call for the Steel test; the rolling of the Steel test and the determination or the result; the realisation that this is enough time to cast Persuasion; and then the resolution of the spell casting.

according to the character sheet you attached to your play report, whatshisname, Aedros (I am not going back to look up spelling) has "hurt for a hurt" and "never admit I'm wrong" as traits. With those traits, saying he might hesitate--that is, second-guess himself and think that he might have been wrong in choosing to attack--was out of character. But another player was still able to force him to make that test. Even if those traits gave him bonuses to the roll, he didn't choose to make that roll himself.

I will never admit I am wrong is a Belief. Aedhros was acting on it, in ruthlessly trying to murder the innkeeper. Always repay hurt with hurt is an Instinct, and in this context allows me to assert, with no need for a test, that Aedhros is in the room ready to kill the innkeeper.

They don't affect the Steel test. I could have gone for Mouldbreaker persona, by choosing to have Aedhros fall to his knees and beg for mercy (lamenting his inability to prevent his spouse's death) - but I chose not to. I didn't think that Aedhros was yet at that point.

 

[pemerton]

If I had the bulk to have an 18 strength, I'd probably have fallen as the grass probably would not have supported that amount of mass. I was a very thin teen.

OK? So what you're saying is that having 18 STR should make a D&D PC worse at climbing?