D&D General 1s and 20s: D&D's Narrative Mechanics

[Micah Sweet]

This is a good point. Rare events are to be celebrated or have weight or whatever, so it often inspires people to make 1s and 20s "matter." If there are critical hits and fumbles, that is built into combat. But D&D doesn't really do that for skill rolls.

I assume you mean WotC when you say D&D? Because other 5e games, like Level Up, do make use of "critical" effects or similar for ability rolls.

 

[zakael19]

This is a good point. Rare events are to be celebrated or have weight or whatever, so it often inspires people to make 1s and 20s "matter." If there are critical hits and fumbles, that is built into combat. But D&D doesn't really do that for skill rolls.

Yet culturally we have, and thus there’s an expectation that you do get More or Things Go Extra Bad as you note in the OP.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

I know you enjoy other games, but right here you're talking about Narrativism, and that's what being responded to.

So can you explain how I'm "biased" when I literally don't have a preference as you seem to be acknowledging? I mean to be honest right now I'd love to see a real slick high production value simulationist fantasy RPG but everyone seems happy enough with clunky ones.

AFAICT the only games I'm "biased" against are those with unreflective rules design and/or terrible art - both of which are very rare today!

 

[Micah Sweet]

So can you explain how I'm "biased" when I literally don't have a preference as you seem to be acknowledging? I mean to be honest right now I'd love to see a real slick high production value simulationist fantasy RPG but everyone seems happy enough with clunky ones.

AFAICT the only games I'm "biased" against are those with unreflective rules design and/or terrible art - both of which are very rare today!

I didn't say you don't have a preference. I said you enjoy other games. I prefer sandbox play, but I've played plenty of APs as well.

What exactly are your definitions of "clunky" vs. "High production value"? I suspect you and I might see the same games in different boxes.

 

[AlViking]

Agree to disagree about what exactly? It seems a bit strange to ask for that whilst literally labelling my opinions as "BS" in the sentence before, but you could at least clarify the object of the request.

You also haven't explained how I'm "biased" despite running and enjoying both narrative and gamist games (and simulationist, for that matter). It's be great if you could do that. My personal experience is that there's a unique animus directed towards narrative games. It's strange but easy to show (as per the Reddit post earlier). Some people take them even existing rather personally.

The bias is apparent to me, I explained it, but you're obviously oblivious to it.

Rehashing the same old same old isn't going to change anything.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

I didn't say you don't have a preference. I said you enjoy other games. I prefer sandbox play, but I've played plenty of APs as well.

What exactly are your definitions of "clunky" vs. "High production value"? I suspect you and I might see the same games in different boxes.

Clunky is stuff like Rolemaster with it's endless tables. High production values is D&D or Daggerheart or arguably Shadowdark for that matter (and intentionally retro look doesn't conflict with high production values).

 

[Micah Sweet]

Clunky is stuff like Rolemaster with it's endless tables. High production values is D&D or Daggerheart or arguably Shadowdark for that matter (and intentionally retro look doesn't conflict with high production values).

Ok, then you're probably right by your standards. I really like tables in my games (a lot of which appear in Shadowdark, by the way).

 

[Ruin Explorer]

The bias is apparent to me, I explained it, but you're obviously oblivious to it.

Rehashing the same old same old isn't going to change anything.

You did not, in fact, explain it. The reality is that narrative styles and games face some peculiar and specific hostility in the present day and calling pointing that out "bias" is a bit silly. It's interesting to me because that hostility didn't emerge until they became popular and somewhat mainstream, as much as any non-D&D game can be said to be such. Prior to that there was similar hostility towards gamism, but three primarily gamist editions of D&D largely put paid to that!

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Ok, then you're probably right by your standards. I really like tables in my games (a lot of which appear in Shadowdark, by the way).

All the Shadowdark tables I've seen have been pretty short, evocative and cool. I like a good table, just not endless pages of dull ones!

 

[Micah Sweet]

You did not, in fact, explain it. The reality is that narrative styles and games face some peculiar and specific hostility in the present day and calling pointing that out "bias" is a bit silly. It's interesting to me because that hostility didn't emerge until they became popular and somewhat mainstream, as much as any non-D&D game can be said to be such. Prior to that there was similar hostility towards gamism, but three primarily gamist editions of D&D largely put paid to that!

I agree that WotC's game designs are strongly gamist (to different degrees of course, and obviously there's other stuff going on too). 5.5 is definitely more Narrativist-leaning than their previous non-4e offerings though.

It does seem to me that fans of Simulation are having their preferences steadily chipped away in the larger hobby (and certainly in the larger industry), however, and I can certainly understand not wanting to take that in silence.