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

[Maxperson]

My understanding of 5e D&D is that it is permissible for the GM to call for a roll to see if a PC notices something (perception-type checks) or knows/remembers something (knowledge-type checks).

I also thought that, if the GM (say) has a sphinx ask a riddle, a player isn't entitled to just decide that their PC knows the answer.

Correct. The player can decide what their character does or says, but can't metagame unless the DM changes the rules to allow metagaming.

 

[AnotherGuy]

In D&D the player decides what their character is emotionally and mentally capable of.

What frustrated me (particularly in the early years) was that it was possible for a player to downplay the emotional and character development side of their character because that portion of the game did not include mechanics and had no effect on any of the play priorities of the game. I enjoy the character development aspect of a hero and I found D&D catered only for adventure. As a GM I was trying to make interesting well-rounded NPCs but there was nothing in the system that encouraged the same from my fellow players. It was exasperating.

We see character development all the time onscreen with heroes and villains in our favourite movies, and I wanted to bring some of that to the table.

The alignment system was too brutal in its approach for both GM and players. Vampire the Masquerade came up with Humanity/Paths and had stats for Virtues which was mechanised. Still a lot fell on the shoulders of the Storyteller.
To me it seems PbtA games brought that theme to the fore, making it a priority, requiring that growth in playstyle which is encouraged by a system with a polished (improved) mechanic.

Players with that innate creativity and thoughtfulness for character are great, but having mechanics and techniques to bring out that style of play from your run-of-the-mill GMs and players (which most of us are) is so much better IMO.

 

[Thomas Shey]

What frustrated me (particularly in the early years) was that it was possible for a player to downplay the emotional and character development side of their character because that portion of the game did not include mechanics and had no effect on any of the play priorities of the game. I enjoy the character development aspect of a hero and I found D&D catered only for adventure. As a GM I was trying to make interesting well-rounded NPCs but there was nothing in the system that encouraged the same from my fellow players. It was exasperating.

Wasn't like token play wasn't a fairly common, even popular style early on (the game got its start with wargamers after all), and its hardly extinct. Whether that's a good thing is in the eye of the beholder.

We see character development all the time onscreen with heroes and villains in our favourite movies, and I wanted to bring some of that to the table.

The alignment system was too brutal in its approach for both GM and players. Vampire the Masquerade came up with Humanity/Paths and had stats for Virtues which was mechanised. Still a lot fell on the shoulders of the Storyteller.

I have to point out there were games in the build-point realm that had personality traits and flaws as part of the core mechanics fairly early on (Hero and GURPS) and ones that still do in the trad realm (Savage Worlds). One difference is that they made them, effectively voluntary (though because they yield indirect mechanical benefits, attractive). I suspect there's a lot of people in the trad sphere who are much more willing to engage with social and psychological mechanics with teeth when they've actively signed off on them.

 

[Imaro]

What frustrated me (particularly in the early years) was that it was possible for a player to downplay the emotional and character development side of their character because that portion of the game did not include mechanics and had no effect on any of the play priorities of the game. I enjoy the character development aspect of a hero and I found D&D catered only for adventure. As a GM I was trying to make interesting well-rounded NPCs but there was nothing in the system that encouraged the same from my fellow players. It was exasperating.

I think the question then becomes... were you and your players desires aligned? I wonder this whenever I see a DM who is dissapointed that the game does not force incentivize a player into roleplaying

We see character development all the time onscreen with heroes and villains in our favourite movies, and I wanted to bring some of that to the table.

But was that the type of game your players wanted? You keep speaking from your wants or your desires but it is a collaborative game of multiple people.

The alignment system was too brutal in its approach for both GM and players. Vampire the Masquerade came up with Humanity/Paths and had stats for Virtues which was mechanised. Still a lot fell on the shoulders of the Storyteller.

In what way? Also what edition of D&D are you speaking to?

To me it seems PbtA games brought that theme to the fore, making it a priority, requiring that growth in playstyle which is encouraged by a system with a polished (improved) mechanic.

How did PbtA do this? I've run MotW and am curious in what you are referencing here.

Players with that innate creativity and thoughtfulness for character are great, but having mechanics and techniques to bring out that style of play from your run-of-the-mill GMs and players (which most of us are) is so much better IMO.

Again there is a thin line between coaxing and forcing. I think the most important thing is having players who desire the same roleplaying goals as you do.

 

[Maxperson]

One is a subset of the other.

No they aren't. There's is no part of "the player controls what his PC says and does" that touches on "the player authors the fiction outside of the PC," and vice versa. They are two very different things.

I’m not sure what this means. I play and run a variety of games, and I’m applying the idea of agency consistently to them all. I’m not changing agency for my Spire campaign from how I view it for my Mothership campaign.

See above. The two types of agency cannot happen at the same time. You cannot both author the fiction outside the PC in the same moment as you are saying what the PC does or says that affects things. They can occur closely after one another, but so can multiple instances of one or the other.

Time is finite. You cannot have more agency in one game that the other, because the two agencies are mutually exclusive in the same moment of time.

Ha okay.

Maybe you're some magic man that controls time and creates time loops or does other crazy stuff that no one else can. I doubt it, though.

I don’t know who the “we” is that you’re referring to. Proponents of a living world would not allow the game to grind to a halt due to players not being proactive.

Nice Strawman. I'm not talking about a living world. I'm talking about a sandbox. In fact, if you were actually going to start reading to understand instead of reading to reply, you'd have read that I said that when the game shifts to be more linear with the passive players, the living portion of the game still happens. So of course a living world doesn't grind to a halt due to players not being proactive. A sandbox does, though. A sandbox cannot happen if the DM is initiating things.

I understand the approach quite well. As I said, if the PCs do nothing, that doesn’t mean nothing happens. That goes against the idea of a living world. I find your accusations that I don’t understand this type of play to be unfounded and clearly ironic.

You said that in less 10 seconds of game gnolls could seek out giants, persuade them to attack, and then the giants could get to town to attack it. Because that's how much time happens when nothing is happening. The players aren't sitting at the table in the inn for the days or weeks it would take for all that to happen.

As for time, two things. First, the passage of time is an illusion. It can go as fast or as slow as we’d like. However, second, I never said to take only ten seconds to do this. If you were familiar with a living world, you’d know that the GM would be determining these developments at regular intervals. So, if the PCs don’t address the gnoll pack raiding caravans, then the pack collects booty from the raids. Maybe after a month, they’ll have enough to coin to approach the giants. Maybe a couple weeks later, they attack the town.

You did say 10 seconds, because that's how much time passes while the PCs are just sitting at the table and the players are staring at me. And it was during the staring time that this is all happening.

If I'm going to initiate something, it's not going to be something that takes days or weeks to happen when only a few seconds of game time are happening.

In a living world the DM doesn't just decide to backdate time and have something occur in the past that did not already happen, so the gnolls didn't decide to retroactively have approached the giants.

It would 1) have already have had to be planned, and 2) could not be aimed at the PCs like that. If either one of those isn't happening, it's not part of a living world.

If I'm initiating something to get the game moving with passive players, it cannot be part of the living world unless it just coincidentally was something pre-planned for that specific moment and the PCs just happened to proactively go there. None of which occurs when PCs are passively sitting at a bar.

In the event of players who don’t do anything, you can offer them opportunities for action. If they don’t take any, then you have the gnolls and giants attack town. Now they have to do something. Hopefully, this provokes them to be less inactive in the future.

Right. I said that. It's just not 1) a living breathing part of the world, and 2) not a sandbox any longer.

I also said that in my experience, passive players don't switch to proactive. Your experience may be different, but in mine if they aren't proactive from the get go, I have to initiate things a lot over the course of the entire campaign.

 

[Micah Sweet]

No.

Of course you and @Faolyn can believe what you like. But what you say in this post is incorrect.

If they believe one thing, and you believe something else, neither of you are "incorrect". You have different opinions about a subjective thing.

 

[pemerton]

In this situation of hesitation, were the dice rolled and determined the action didn't succeed, and the player decided that their character hesitated? Or did the outcome of the dice determine that the failure was due to hesitation? In the latter, it would be understandable how that might not sit well with someone, even those who believe their story happens at the table.

Burning Wheel has a subsystem called Steel. Multiple aspects of the character's build feed into this subsystem.

A PC has an initial steel rating, which is determined by reference both to some of their stats, and to various aspects of their backstory (eg having given birth to a child adds +1 to the initial rating). Steel advances in play in a fashion broadly similar to other abilities.

Steel is tested when the GM calls for a test; more on this immediately below. But for completeness, I'll also note that if the player declares a particular type of manoeuvre for their PC in a skirmish (roughly, closing with someone who is shooting at you, without taking advantage of cover or manoeuvring - ie a steady advance or charge across open ground) this is also resolved via a Steel test.

When the GM calls for a Steel test, the general rules for tests apply - ie there must be something at stake, as determined by the player-authored PC priorities (Beliefs, Instincts, traits, relationships, etc). And also, the circumstances must be the sort of circumstances that can trigger a Steel test. These are listed in the rulebook, and include fear, shock, surprise, pain, wonderment at magical effects, and attempting cold-blooded murder or similar ruthless action. The rulebook has dozens of descriptors for these sorts of circumstances, so I am not going to copy them all out. I'm trusting that what I have said conveys the gist.

The obstacle for the Steel test is Hesitation, which is rated as 10 - Will. (Assuming a mundane shade for Will - Grey (Heroic) or White (Supernatural) shade change the calculation.) There are traits which can modify hesitation, either globally or contextually (eg the cold-blooded trait reduces hesitation from murder; the fearless trait reduces hesitation from the fear of violence, but expressly excludes murder from the reduction; etc). The obstacle for the Steel test can also be modified by circumstances, eg committing murder is +2 Ob. When the test is rolled, if it it fails each degree of failure constitutes hesitation for 1 action (which is a unit of time measurement that the system uses - roughly 1 action equals 1 heartbeat, so a second or so).

The effect of this means that low Steel and low Will are likely to produce hesitation (few dice against a high Ob); whereas mediocre or better Steel and high Will have a good chance of not producing hesitation (a reasonable number of dice against a low Ob).

If the character hesitates, the player gets to choose what the character does - there is a default list, and various traits can change or add to the list. The default options are to "stand and drool" ie be too shocked or stunned to do anything; fall prone and beg for mercy; swoon; or run screaming.

There are also rules for determining how to factor actions of hesitation into various contexts of resolution, which don't use a uniform action economy (and in some cases don't use an action economy at all).

 

[pemerton]

Correct. The player can decide what their character does or says, but can't metagame unless the DM changes the rules to allow metagaming.

I was replying to a post that said that players in D&D decide what their PC's mental capabilities are.

 

[pemerton]

If they believe one thing, and you believe something else, neither of you are "incorrect". You have different opinions about a subjective thing.

I don't think the content of the Burning Wheel rulebooks is a subjective matter. There are words of English printed on the pages.

 

[Faolyn]

Yes. It doesn't say that you have to make a roll to make a decision. If you fail the roll, you fail at your action. It is making the decision to attempt murder that required Aedhros to make the Steel test.

I don't understand why you think you can school me in the play of Burning Wheel. As far as I know you've never even played it, or read the rules!

It's like @Faolyn, who has never read the rules, thinking that there's some ambiguity in the fact that attempting cold-blooded murder can trigger a Steel test.

No, that's not where my "misunderstanding" is.

You said another player can call for it. Your example is of a player who put on their "GM hat." You have not outright stated whether that player is a player-player (i.e., someone who only controls their own PC) or the GM (who controls all NPCs). Nor have you outright stated that this is a game where any player can control any PC or NPC.

You have said that a character's traits--beliefs and instincts--don't matter re: making a steel test to see if they hesitate before they commit murder, even if the person has traits that put them on the blood-thirsty side and make it so they don't second-guess themselves and therefore wouldn't hesitate. I consider that to be a bad rule.

You said that PC 1 didn't want PC 2 to commit murder, so PC 1's Player called for PC 2's Player to make a roll that could prevent PC 2 from committing murder (thus using out-of-game/metagame methods to enforce in-game wishes). You have claimed that the GM (or player that puts on a GM hat) has no choice as to when to request this roll, but at the same time said that the roll can only be made under certain circumstances, without clarifying how the GM can decide if those circumstances are met. Also, the circumstances that are required were not present in the given example, thus further indicating that the GM--or a player who puts on a GM hat--can choose when they want to insist on the roll no matter the circumstances. I consider this to be a collection of bad rules.

If you want to buy me a copy of the game so I can read the entire ruleset, go ahead.