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

[robertsconley]

Here the bits that feel wrong to me. The point of the conflict is not to create a dramatic story with satisfying narrative beats. The point is to put the characters through a crucible by which we find if what presumed about them is true.

Also, we are not adjusting the world to support a story. We are creating a world or setting as needed to present a premise to test. It's a question, not an answer.

This excerpt from Jesse Burneko's Play Passionately blog captures the essential appeal to me:

You’re misreading my post by selectively highlighting words like “drama,” “dramatic,” and “story” as if they prove I’m secretly describing narrativist play. That’s not analysis, it’s quote-mining out of context to force an interpretation I explicitly rejected.

In the post, I contrast narrativism’s focus on dramatic escalation with the Living World’s emphasis on causality, world logic, and emergent consequences. I use terms like “drama” descriptively, to describe outcomes that might arise, not prescriptively, as goals the system is built to deliver.

I’m not structuring my game world to create dramatic beats or test characters for thematic payoff. I’m structuring it to exist regardless of what the players do. When conflict occurs, it’s because of who the characters are and what the factions want, not because the game needs to escalate for emotional effect.

The key point of my post, which you seem to have overlooked, is that similar outcomes don’t imply shared creative agendas. A Living World game might produce events that feel meaningful or dramatic in retrospect, but that doesn’t make it narrativist. Structure and intent, not surface results, are what distinguish one approach from another.

If you want to argue with my position, argue with what I actually said, not with a few words pulled out of context to make it look like I’m contradicting myself. That kind of framing might work in a rhetorical sparring match, but it doesn’t hold up under an honest reading.

 

[Campbell]

You’re misreading my post by selectively highlighting words like “drama,” “dramatic,” and “story” as if they prove I’m secretly describing narrativist play. That’s not analysis, it’s quote-mining out of context to force an interpretation I explicitly rejected.

In the post, I contrast narrativism’s focus on dramatic escalation with the Living World’s emphasis on causality, world logic, and emergent consequences. I use terms like “drama” descriptively, to describe outcomes that might arise, not prescriptively, as goals the system is built to deliver.

I’m not structuring my game world to create dramatic beats or test characters for thematic payoff. I’m structuring it to exist regardless of what the players do. When conflict occurs, it’s because of who the characters are and what the factions want, not because the game needs to escalate for emotional effect.

The key point of my post, which you seem to have overlooked, is that similar outcomes don’t imply shared creative agendas. A Living World game might produce events that feel meaningful or dramatic in retrospect, but that doesn’t make it narrativist. Structure and intent, not surface results, are what distinguish one approach from another.

If you want to argue with my position, argue with what I actually said, not with a few words pulled out of context to make it look like I’m contradicting myself. That kind of framing might work in a rhetorical sparring match, but it doesn’t hold up under an honest reading.

I'm not speaking to your description of living world stuff here. My entire post was directed entirely towards your description of Narrativist play. I'm saying where I think your description of Narrativist play is off. I get that accurately describing Narrativism is not your priority, but you are being very loose with it in a way that leads to conflating it with typical play of games like Fate and Hillfolk which is it very much not like, not even close to like.

Narrativism is not concerned with drama or theatrics or story beats. It is concerned with character premise, but these are not the same things.

Your conflation of all non-sandbox play is what I am taking exception to, here, and more broadly.

 

[Lanefan]

There's nothing stopping non-exception based design from doing that; you just have a set of rules that explains how to apply the extent system in different situation. Among other things, then you don't need to have every spell and feat be a special snowflake done up ad-hoc; they'll show relationships to other things.

And at the same time, everything gets a whole lot blander.

An example, perhaps:

There's lots of things in the game - spells, feats, magic items, etc. - that affect how a character can or does move: haste, slow, jump, climb, flight are just a few.

The unified-design theory would probably want a one-size-fits-all rule, something like "non-natural* movement effects of any kind or of different kinds cannot stack", i.e. that a creature or person can only have one such effect active on itself at a time. Easy, sure, but boring as hell and, IMO, very lazy design. (a second, corollary, blanket rule would be either A: that having one such effect active denies the application of any others until the first effect has ended, or B: that application of a second such effect overwrites and ends the first)

Far better would be to delineate how each of these different "extra" movement types can or cannot interact with the others, and also with additional instances of itself. Can someone be double-hasted or double-slowed? Do haste and slow on the same person just cancel each other out? If two different things give a character the ability to jump 20 feet straight up, do the two together allow a 40-foot jump? Can a hasted character be given spider climb as well? Etc., etc.

And then start looking at specific feats or items or spells and see if any exceptions then apply to the answers to all the interaction questions above. For example, does wearing boots of speed function differently than a speed-you-up spell? Do slowing effects stack while hasting ones do not? Etc., etc.

And if this means some write-ups get long, so what?

* - the "non-natural" is there to allow for built-in natural movement abilities e.g. an Aarakocra's ability to fly.

 

[Faolyn]

But there is nothing antagonistic about other players following the play, and noting what is at stake and hanging on the dice rolls. And the fact that another player is invested in a given player's PC failing is, in itself, typically going to be sufficient to show that something is at stake.

OK, so you've either had nothing but lovely people to play with or everyone at your table is fine with metagaming.

"I don't want him to succeed" should not be sufficient to show that something is at stake. Not unless there are a ton of safeguards in place to keep it from being used abusively. And no "don't let it be used too much" isn't a safeguard.

Look, if a GM said "I don't want the PC to succeed," I doubt you'd say "gosh, I guess something's really at stake here." I'd bet you'd consider that to be the reddest of red flags. I know I would.

Upthread I posted that "it seems that you are not really recognising the reason why rolls are called for in Burning Wheel." I still have that feeling.

No, I fully understand why. However:

1) For a game that says the GM should only call for rolls if there's a lot at stake, you seem to have people call for rolls for things that only the most nitpicky games would call for, even when such rolls disregard either the flow of action or established character traits; and

2) I don't understand how you can have told me all the things you have about BW and still think it's player-driven. Everything you've shown me about the game, everything I've read about the game by its fans or in the books, indicates that it's only player-driven inasmuch as players have a level of ability to force each other to do things to a degree that I've rarely seen in any other game. The rest of the time it's GM-driven or dice-driven.

The only reason you think I don't understand the rules is because I disagree with them. What, do you think that BW is such a amazing game that I would love it if only I truly understood it the way you do?

In the particular example of play I described, the problem based on the player's priority for his PC is You need the blood of this mage as a sacrifice for your dark master; but he's just been decapitated, and his blood is flowing out of his body into the floor. The player declares how his PC is going to overcome this obstacle: "I look around for a vessel!" The dice are rolled, and the results interpreted - in this case, the test is a success and so the PC achieves what the player wanted for him, that is, he finds a suitable vessel.

Still a completely unnecessary roll in my book. A roll to get the vessel to collect enough blood, because there's stuff in the way and actually moving around is tricky? Sure, OK. A roll to keep other people from trying to get the filled vessel away from you because it's obviously being used for creepy evil magic? Yep, definitely. A roll to see things that are out in the open? That just slows things down and, as I said, means that another player can use metagame knowledge to try to screw the PC over.

The rules have something to say about it, though (pp 30, 32, 44):

"The game has tests. Only use them when necessary. If a PC wants to make a test, because making tests allows the PC to advance, say no. That's being a boring ol' Cheaty McCheaterson." This has nothing to do with what we were talking about at all. And I note that there's nothing there about saying no when another player wants a PC to make a roll. Which is what we're talking about.

Also, we're not talking about Torchbearer.

Also-also, you are once again not understanding what "consent" and "choice" mean. There is a huge, huge difference between a player wanting to roll a test and Player 1 making Player 2 roll a test in the hopes that Player 2 will fail because Player 1 doesn't like Player 2's agenda.

Hmm... it's bad form to ask the GM to make a roll, because making rolls is how you advance your character. But it's totally fine for one player to insist another one make a roll. So simply get two players to force each other to make rolls and they'll all advance in rank! Bwah-hah-hah!

In both games, players want to test, because this is how they advance their PCs. The GM is expected to manage pacing, and framing, in accordance with the core principles that I've set out.

Y'know, I run and play PbtA. I have played CoC in the past. In those games, making rolls is how you advance your PCs (failing for PbtA, succeeding for CoC). I've never seen a single player want to make rolls simply to advance their character. I don't think any of those games have a note for GMs about not letting people roll just to get XP. Well, maybe CoC does; I haven't really read that book fully. I mostly just like reading about the monsters in CoC.

In the case of Tru-Leigh spotting the vessel to catch the blood, that is that - his intent, to be able to save the blood from being lost on the floor of the sick-room, is achieved. He has no other Belief (say, about his deftness with vessels) that creates a reason to think that more is at stake in the scene than what has been resolved. So "say 'yes' or roll the dice" and "let it ride" apply.

I feel I've already answered this question, multiple times. But here it is again.

Yes, yes. But this doesn't answer what I've said, which is that there's nothing at stake to be able to see a cup.

And again, you can say "that's just how I like to run the game" or something like that and I would be fine. We all have our idiosyncracies when we run. I wouldn't want to play in that game, but hey, who cares. But when you say them's the rules, that's how you're supposed to play, well, you're not doing the game any favors. It makes the game look like it's built for obnoxiously nit-picky GMs or for antagonistic, meta-gaming players, neither of which are good looks. You're especially not doing a good job selling it as being better for something than other systems are--which what you did to start this entire sub-thread to begin with!

I have no idea what you mean by the One True Way. I'm talking about what is involved in playing Burning Wheel.

<facepalm> You really don't get it?

Yes. I've posted multiple times upthread, including in reply to you, that there was a Duel of Wits between Thurgon and Aramina. I scripted for Thurgon; the GM scripted for Aramina.

I already quoted the relevant rule for DoW, in the post to which you're replying; and also posted about the scene, in reply to you, what I have reposted below:

I think this provides the answer to your question.

No, because you seem to think quoting rules actually answers the questions I asked.

You claimed that BW was better than D&D because it could do scenes that were intimate, high stakes, and have heft, and cited a time when PC 1 tried to convince PC 2 to mend his armor.

If this attempt was nothing more than a die roll or two, how was it intimate, high stakes, or have any heft? It's literally just a die roll! That's arguably the most boring way possible to resolve a social interaction!

If this attempt involved Player 1 and Player 2 actually roleplaying this discussion, using actual words, and the dice were just there to see if Player 1's words were convincing, then how is this any different from D&D or any other RPG that has persuasion skills in it?

My gods, this thread could have been a hundred posts shorter if you had just answered this question right away!

 

[Faolyn]

If anything, that sounds like an accurate description of the Forge-era habit of using arcane phrasing to intimidate rather than clarify. If we're going to talk about "linguistic tyranny," let's be honest about where that tradition comes from.

World of Darkness games?

 

[Lanefan]

In the particular example of play I described, the problem based on the player's priority for his PC is You need the blood of this mage as a sacrifice for your dark master; but he's just been decapitated, and his blood is flowing out of his body into the floor. The player declares how his PC is going to overcome this obstacle: "I look around for a vessel!" The dice are rolled, and the results interpreted - in this case, the test is a success and so the PC achieves what the player wanted for him, that is, he finds a suitable vessel.

And if the player had "drinking cup" or "empty glass vial with stopper" listed on his character sheet as something he carried in his backpack (given that the character's stated priority is to collect some blood, it seems more than reasonable he'd carry something with him in which to put it), there's no test - he just gets the blood and on you go?

One of the most important aspects of ability tests in game play in Burning Wheel is the Let It Ride rule: A player shall test once against an obstacle and shall not roll again until conditions legitimately and drastically change. Neither GM nor player can call for a retest unless those conditions change. Successes from the initial roll count for all applicable situations in play.​

​

A GM cannot call for multiple rolls of the same ability to accomplish a player’s stated intent. Nor can a player retest a failed roll simply because he failed. Tests must be distilled down to as few rolls as possible. The successes of those rolls ride across the entire situation, scene or session. . . .​

Torchbearer 2e states similar rules (Scholar's Guide, pp 35, 216-7):

Fun Once​

Don’t make the same tests for the same obstacle twice. Either the players have bypassed the original obstacle or it stands but they have to find another way - testing another ability or skill against another obstacle. . . .​

These rules largely mirror what I do in my own game - the one roll you make for something represents your best attempt in the time you have (or the best you're gonna do period if time is near-limitless); and to get another roll either you have to try a different approach or something has to otherwise materially change.

An example of a material change: you try and fail to bash open a stuck door. Someone casts Enlarge on you thus increasing your height by about 1.5x and your mass by about quadruple; this is a material change so if you try the door again, you'll get another roll (probably with a bonus, too!).

Bypass the minutiae; focus on what’s important. Highlight exciting actions. . . . In this game, skills are very broad and the condition rules are punishing. If you focus too closely on the fine-grained details, you’ll crush the players.​

This advice, however, points to a game I would very not want to play. Detail can be everything, and often you don't and can't know whether something trivial will be or become important until after - sometimes well after - the fact.

 

[Lanefan]

Here are three different ways to resolve a journey from A to B, in a RPG. I don't claim that they cover all the possibilities (eg Marvel Heroic RP has a way of doing this which is none of the below), but they do illustrated a variety of approaches. Each approach assumes that the PCs begin in A, and that the players explain their PCs' intention to make the journey, perhaps say a bit about their prep, and then declare "OK, we set off!"

* The GM describes the PCs arriving in B, perhaps adding a bit of colourful narration about the journey, perhaps even calling for a saving throw or similar to see if a PC is tired or injured when they arrive at B.​

​

* The GM calls for a roll - perhaps a WIS (Survival) check, in 5e D&D - against an appropriate DC, and then adjudicates success or failure in the typical way: on a success, the PCs arrive at B; on a failure, something goes wrong (which may include arriving at B but having suffered some sort of setback - this will depend on the details of the resolution system).​

​

* The GM refers to their hex map that shows A, B and the terrain in between, and begins applying the overland travel procedure found in classic D&D (it's roughly the same procedure found in the original books, in Gygax's DMG, and in Cook/Marsh Expert) - tracking travel in terms of hexes per day, making encounter rolls and rolls for getting lost, expecting the players to make a map of their PC's journey that will also assist them in working out if their PCs have become lost, etc.​

Thing is, depending on the specifics of the journey I might resolve it in any of these three ways, or something similar. I don't bind myself to just one way of doing it.

If it's through mostly or entirely safe lands, it'll be me either describing a bit of colour about the journey or just telling them they've arrived, and how many days it took.

If part of the trip carries some risk but the rest is safe, or for any sea journey longer than about half a day, it'd be closer to the second one above - I'll give them a roll to see if anything goes adrift and if it comes up that something did, then I'll determine if it was weather-related or monster-related or navigation-related or what.

If the trip is all potentially risky then it's done day by day (or if risks are extreme, even hour by hour) much as per the third above.

In any case, I'll always narrate the weather and if relevant make sure they pay for their inns, meals, etc.

 

[AnotherGuy]

The point is to put the characters through a crucible by which we find if what presumed about them is true.

We are creating a world or setting as needed to present a premise to test. It's a question, not an answer.

How does one derive this crucible or create a world/setting as needed to present a premise to test? Is it via collaboration or is the GM shifting the story towards this crucible via the failures on the rolls?
Are there specific techniques which are employed to create this question via the setting?

In my sandbox campaign, I'm constantly scouring the characters' Traits, Ideals, Bonds and Flaws to see if/and how they can be applied as the natural story emerges (players are encouraged to do this too, but I'm the primary driver since I find and enjoy that internal character test). The players and I are not actively driving the story to test their Traits, Ideals, Bonds and Flaws. If the story presents that test and I'm alert to the opportunity, I do so. I have found the players at my table actually enjoy that struggle.
It is not a perfect process at all since the game was not designed for that.

 

[Older Beholder]

Sometimes a railroad is all stops, other times it's an express.
Sometimes a sandbox is a desert, other times it's a kitty litter tray.

No right or wrong, all valid ways to play.

 

[robertsconley]

Sometimes a railroad is all stops, other times it's an express.
Sometimes a sandbox is a desert, other times it's a kitty litter tray.

No right or wrong, all valid ways to play.

I know this is weird, but when I saw this, I thought it needed to be a haiku!

Railroad or sandbox,
Steel tracks hum or soft paw prints,
All play finds its path.