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

[Faolyn]

I mean, games where players have a higher level of authority are going to be more vulnerable to players who act in bad faith. If mitigating players with negative tendencies is a concern, than I would agree that games with higher levels of DM authority are almost certainly better suited.

Disagree. Higher levels of GM authority would work only if the problems are due to rules disagreements or if the GM is willing to say "I don't care what the rules say, you're not doing X." Which itself can be abusive if the GM is saying that to nerf or railroad players. But assuming that's not the case, it doesn't help if the rules themselves are built to allow or require antagonism or metagaming.

I think reasonable GMs can disagree whether or not "finding a cup" was high enough stakes to call for a roll. It's a judgment call.

Sure. And as a judgement call, that's fine. It's when the game insists that you roll for something like that, that's when it stops being player-driven. At that point, you're getting close to "rolling to walk" territory.

There's also a pretty big difference between "players holding each other to account to follow the rules" and "players screwing each other over." When I remind another player they forgot to roll a bane effect in 5e, I'm not "screwing them over", I'm holding them to the rules structure we all agreed to maintain.

This is very different than the BW example, though.

In this, somebody cast bane on a PC. You remind that PC that they have a penalty to their roll. Fair enough. There was an existing reason for you to remind the GM and player about the penalty.

In the first example @pemerton gave, PC 1 didn't want PC 2 to do a thing (murder someone), so Player 1 had Player 2 make a roll to see if he could--even though he had traits which suggested that he was OK with murder. This isn't like Player 1 reminding Player 2 that he's had bane cast on him. It's not even as if PC 1 cast bane on PC 2, because that would be PC 1 using in-game methods to hinder PC 2.

Likewise, in the second example, it would be considered acceptable for Player 1 to attempt to hinder Player 2 (who needs to collect blood), even though PC 1 isn't in the scene and has no knowledge of what's going on. This is pure metagaming.

Although I suppose that means pemerton was right to call it player-driven, because it's definitely not character-driven.

@pemerton's been posting here a really long time. He's not going to make a rookie mistake like making an obviously normative statement like "BW is better than D&D." You might be imputing that, but having a preference and saying "my game is better" are two very different things.

No, he literally said that. I don't really feel like going back through the last 500 posts to find it, but it was basically that BW is better because it allows for more intimate scenes (or possibly meaningful or hefty, can't remember the exact word used).

I take it you prefer "thespian narration leading to group consensus over which performance was better" as the superior, more player-focused method of resolution?

I'd like answers as to why a die roll is more intimate or heftier than a scene that is actually role-played out.

 

[TwoSix]

Time and again you refer to things like "the crucible" and "playing these characters under pressure". Manbearcat often refers to (paraphrasing) putting the characters in a firehose.

To me that sounds like typical game play would be - and is intended to be - heavily stress-inducing for the players; hardly what's wanted by the (I suspect massive) majority of players who see the game as a chance to kick back, relax, and get away from stress in real life.

I think a pretty core distinction between some of us is the assumption that we’re looking for play this is less “casual/hangout” (although that’s OK at times) and instead play is done with more intentionality.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I think a pretty core distinction between some of us is the assumption that we’re looking for play this is less “casual/hangout” (although that’s OK at times) and instead play is done with more intentionality.

Funny how that point gets raised pretty rarely.

 

[Lanefan]

I think a pretty core distinction between some of us is the assumption that we’re looking for play this is less “casual/hangout” (although that’s OK at times) and instead play is done with more intentionality.

Fair enough.

My point is that those looking for that degree of intense play are, I think, in the possibly-extreme minority among the greater RPG community.

Further, because those who look for more intense play tend to (by all appearances!) take their gaming much more seriously than do most it naturally follows they'll tend to get more involved in forums and discussions like this one than would the more casual player or DM, and thus that small minority ends up with an outsized voice on said forums.

 

[TwoSix]

Funny how that point gets raised pretty rarely.

Amazing how we can have 6,000 posts and not cover everything!

 

[TwoSix]

Fair enough.

My point is that those looking for that degree of intense play are, I think, in the possibly-extreme minority among the greater RPG community.

Further, because those who look for more intense play tend to (by all appearances!) take their gaming much more seriously than do most it naturally follows they'll tend to get more involved in forums and discussions like this one than would the more casual player or DM, and thus that small minority ends up with an outsized voice on said forums.

Sure. Which is we should also assume that for conversations on forums, the audience has self-selected to be less “casual” and more intense.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Amazing how we can have 6,000 posts and not cover everything!

True. This seems important though. As @Lanefan mentioned, any game that demands that much buy-in is necessarily going to draw a smaller and likely more dedicated group of enthusiasts. Conversely, if you engage in RPG play for more casual and/or more social reasons (and anecdotally most gamers I've met do), this kind of more intense play may not appeal.

 

[thefutilist]

Right, this is quite incisive. It's the key element of the GM-centered and directed nature of living world play. The problem I have, why I go further and describe ALL plausibility as simply GM-directed, is that the assertions made as to the robustness of the much vaunted GM adjudication of what is plausible, what the narrative constraints are on the GM, is tissue paper. GMs do what they feel like doing. These appeals to 'logic' or whatever are just lampshades.

We've gone back and forth on this in the 'GM fiat - an illustration' thread. A brief primer for those who didn't read it.

A) Are decisions constrained by established fictional constraints, including extrapolations based on 'plausibility',

different to:

B) The GM (or whoever) deciding something based on how they want the fiction to go and then creating the fiction to justify it post-hoc.


My view was that the first (A) basically constitutes the medium of role-playing. Without it you're just generating fiction.


The problem is as follows:

The constraint can't 'actually' be plausibility because it's possible to extrapolate the exact opposite.

But you're making the perfect the enemy of the good. Is also a totally irrelevant defence for the many reasons you, pemerton, hawkeyefan, manbear, have all pointed out.

My response (which living world advocates can't use) is that plausibility (or character immersion) is actually a lamp shade for artistic expression.

My repeated example was that you can want a character (you control) to do something but the demands of the fiction/authenticity means they must do the opposite thing.

The thing is. This makes sense to me when talking about a character (pc or npc) making a charged ethos driven decision, it makes far less sense when talking about warehouse awnings.

 

[hawkeyefan]

Can I ask why you want to talk about that? Clearly the GM-driven parts of sandbox play are not a problem for enthusiasts, and the focus on sandbox in contrast to a more AP-structured style focuses on player freedom to make choices and not on the fact that the GM still creates the setting and controls things outside of the PCs. What exactly are you trying to accomplish?

I've been explaining my opinions on the matter. I don't think that the living world sandbox type play being discussed is as player-focused as is being stated.

That's not really a problem... as I've said, I run games like that myself. But I view them differently. My opinions and ideas on the matter have been challenged, so I've posted to explain myself.

It really depends on what you are adding and why. The overwhelming majority of the time I'm not considering game play when I add in NPCs, factions, items, etc. The primary time I do consider it is when I am planning encounters, because XP and challenge are inherent to the play of the game, so it has to be a consideration. Very occasionally a randomly rolled magic item will be discarded as too boring or too powerful, which would be game play consideration.

I'm not sure what you mean by "adding"... I'm talking about the creation of the setting and everything within it. Is that what you mean? If one is working with a pre-existing setting of some sort, then I can see why you might call it adding... if that's not what you meant, let me know.

Assuming that is what you meant, when you create an NPC, you are thinking solely of their place in the fictional setting? You don't think in terms of the game at all? Like, have you given then a level and other game statistics? Have you created any existing connections with other NPCs or factions, or any goals for the NPC that may offer opportunities to the players?

This is something I'm always keeping in mind when I create an NPC, whether it's ahead of play or during play.

I’ve done that as well, although it was a while ago. It’s why I’m a stickler now for how not running games that are more “high-concept” and have a starting rationale for PC cooperation.

I think it's generally easier if there is something connecting the PCs in some way. They don't have to be friends or even companions, but they can be bound by geography or by cause. Something that connects them so that what each does somehow matters to the shared fiction of the game.

In my Spire campaign that I've talked about, the characters started off as companions with a mutual cause. But by the end, the means they wanted to use in the name of that cause shifted, so that it was very much two PCs against another. They basically came to the realization that, although the third PC was admirable and right in many ways, he was going to cause so much upheaval as to be problematic... and so he had to go.

Time and again you refer to things like "the crucible" and "playing these characters under pressure". Manbearcat often refers to (paraphrasing) putting the characters in a firehose.

To me that sounds like typical game play would be - and is intended to be - heavily stress-inducing for the players; hardly what's wanted by the (I suspect massive) majority of players who see the game as a chance to kick back, relax, and get away from stress in real life.

So what? That you may not get the appeal doesn't mean there is none.

Funny how that point gets raised pretty rarely.

Raised? Or noticed?

Pretty sure @Campbell points out his preference routinely. As do many others. I've said probably a dozen times in this thread that I want play to be about conflict.

Fair enough.

My point is that those looking for that degree of intense play are, I think, in the possibly-extreme minority among the greater RPG community.

Further, because those who look for more intense play tend to (by all appearances!) take their gaming much more seriously than do most it naturally follows they'll tend to get more involved in forums and discussions like this one than would the more casual player or DM, and thus that small minority ends up with an outsized voice on said forums.

Yes, clearly ENW is dominated by the non-traditional crew.

You have roughly three times as many posts as I do, Lanefan. It's not just pesky fans of more serious play who are invested in forums.

Give me a break.

 

[zakael19]

Fair enough.

My point is that those looking for that degree of intense play are, I think, in the possibly-extreme minority among the greater RPG community.

Further, because those who look for more intense play tend to (by all appearances!) take their gaming much more seriously than do most it naturally follows they'll tend to get more involved in forums and discussions like this one than would the more casual player or DM, and thus that small minority ends up with an outsized voice on said forums.

I think there’s degrees of “character crucible” or whatever as well. I definitely don’t push as hard as some of the folks who participate here, but my play across games is very character-relationship centric even when in an exploration/expedition type phase. I think the "intensity" there tends to be an expectation that all players are on the hook to contribute at any moment via active spotlighting and shared contributions, whereas in a lot of previous D&D style play perhaps if the current scene was a "social" one a single player or two were shouldering most of the load; in combat people might partially check out until their turn; etc. But that's technique and questions that just happen to be helped out, and a desire to not shoulder the load of keeping play going as the GM.

It seems like a lot of "modern 5e" play with a "roleplaying" emphasis falls along these lines, but minus the premise/situation imposed stakes most of the time. That's probably the biggest difference between my Tuesday game & the same player's D&D game - relatively similar emphasis on characters, but from what they've shared less imposition from complication or provocative question and more voluntary writers-room style "ooh, what if your character is actually my old mentor's killer and they dont know it!" sort of like drama.