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

[Bedrockgames]

This is what is so frustrating about these conversations. Please stop rewriting the example. I wasn't talking about a random encounter. I was talking about the DM having a group of bandits in the area attacking a caravan.

I didn't realize that was the example. Again, if I have a group of bandits in an area attacking caravans, I genuinely don't know what my players will do with that. It might be something where the players work to avoid them if they are going through the area, so they never have an interaction, they might try to work with them, they might try to stop them, they might be entirely neutral towards them. It depends on what the players want to do.


Also just passing by where a group of bandits attack, would generally not mean an automatic encounter. In my system they would be one result on a table most likely in that area. Players could still seek them out if they know about them. But my point is, me putting them on the map doesn't mean I am planning anything to happen

 

[robertsconley]

I guess, at the end of the day, this is why we will not agree.

You have created a setting, characters and plot (NPC X has Y motivations and Z will occur unless the PC's do something to change that) is, to me, acting like a story teller. Not knowing the conclusion of a story does not make one not a storyteller. You have every element of a story in place. The elements of that story are based on the characters that are created. Not always, of course, but sometimes.

To me, that is 100% a story teller.

But, I do get that some people only see it as being a story teller if the complete story is known. Of course, deciding the outcome of any event that does not include the PC's is 100% story telling. How could it not be. If you decide, because of the "logic of the setting" that X happens, to me, that's story telling. It's what DM's do.

So we are on the same page, this is what kicked off the subthread:

This is incorrect. While nothing is specifically created by the referee for the players as their characters. During the pre game and the campaign detailed locations and NPCs are created because of the players choices either for their characters or as their characters.

What I’m doing during pre-game is more akin to being a travel agent, not a storyteller. The players ask about various places that interest them. If those places are already in my notes, I describe what’s there. If not, I say I’ll get back to them, and then I flesh out the location. Then I will describe what it is I written.

This is the key point: I’m not handing them the beginning of a story. I’m answering questions about the setting. It’s a snapshot of a specific time and place. I’m not writing a narrative or fragments of one. If they ask about a location’s history, I’ll recount it, like a historian, not a dramatist. Think of it the way Tolkien wrote the appendices for The Return of the King: lore, not plot.

During play, the players say where they want to go. If it’s in my notes, I describe it. If it’s not, I'll build it. If it needs a deeper dive, I may ask to pause the session early and prep over the week. Still, I’m not telling a story, I’m creating a description of a situation, person, or location, with enough structure for the players to act.

To illustrate, here’s a slice of my Majestic Fantasy Realms. Pick any place on the map and I’ll describe it to you:

This isn’t about semantics. It’s about who authors what, when, and for what purpose.

 

[Pedantic]

Feels like we're into pretty meta territory, in that storyteller/not storyteller divide seems to be entirely down to the relationship between the GM and their output. I don't think we can or should remove the GM's intention and approach from any analysis of what they're doing.

To be honest, I thought it was a bit of a stretch the first time I saw RPGs described as "collaborative storytelling" in the first place. My view at the time was that stories get to cheat and make up new actions on the fly, exceed the basic effectiveness of the action economy and so on, not being bound by the constraints of being a game that runs on systems. It didn't occur to me for many years that this might be viewed as a problem, instead of a defining feature of the medium.

 

[SableWyvern]

And yet you use the quote - If everything is X, then nothing is. So, you're using it without understanding that the whole point was it was NOT TRUE.

I also haven't seen the Incredibles and don't know the context of its use in that movie. However, I can assure you that the phrase was not invented by the Incredibles and the context it was used in in that movie does not carry any special weight. There is no reason to expect anyone else using the phrase is trying to emulate whatever point was being made in the Incredibles.

The most common usage I've seen of the phrase is to say that if everything is a priority, then nothing is, which is absolutely a truism.

 

[SableWyvern]

This is what is so frustrating about these conversations. Please stop rewriting the example. I wasn't talking about a random encounter. I was talking about the DM having a group of bandits in the area attacking a caravan.

But the kind of prep we're talking about here isn't, "These bandits will be attacking this caravan when the PCs arrive on scene."

It is instead, "This is a caravan route, and there are bandits that prey on some of the caravans." One of the most likely way this will actually impact play is via a random encounter with bandits.

 

[zakael19]

That raises a question I recently asked a friend who enjoys BW, PbtA, and similar systems. Let’s say you finish your Stonetop campaign in a year or two. Would you feel comfortable using the system again for another campaign, with a new set of characters, in 2027? And again in 2030 or 2035?

My friend, who’s played in my Majestic Wilderlands campaign, so he's familiar with my approach, said he wouldn’t keep the same setting like I do. He enjoys building new settings collaboratively with the group each time. So while he couldn’t say how he’d handle long-term continuity with a system like BW or PbtA, he valued the fresh start each time.

From what I’ve read in the rulebooks, I don’t think there’s anything in the mechanics that would prevent this kind of continuity. But as my friend put it, the group would have to “buy in” to whatever was carried over from previous campaigns. So I am curious to know what you think about this since you have a lot of experience with this style of play.

So I can't speak for everybody, but I'm quite literally running two games of Stonetop at the same time. There's no playbook overlap between either so far, and each playbook brings its own set of priorities and "flags" of what is intrinsically relevant in play (with 3 separate Backgrounds each with bespoke questions that set pretty different priorities and initial conditions); and both groups have focused in on different overarching interests; what a DW game would probably consider a "Campaign Front?"

Given how broad the setting is, how different the group's answers can be to the same things much less the priorities they set (and again, as the GM what you use to highlight or bring forward as Threats or Opportunities) there's plenty of space to discover wildly different things.

A couple concrete examples: there's space for a narrative large scale dungeon nearby the town. One group has gone down to about 1/3rd of the way in chasing some specific priorities; the other hasn't touched it at all. There's one large town in the area of the world, I've seen some groups spend 15-20 sessions just doing political games there and in the area around it. There's a bunch of magic items (Arcana), many of which have the ability to kinda fundamentally change the game once unlocked; or via consequences.

Will I start a new game immediately upon wrapping my longer running one up? Probably not, it'll be time for a change. Maybe once both conclude, whenever that is!

 

[robertsconley]

So, in what way, when you describe the world first - events that are going on, history, conflicts - is that not telling a story? This is what I just can't wrap my head around. How can you claim that this isn't a story? You have every single element of a story except the conclusion. Which, frankly, is what we're playing for. We play the game to write the conclusion of the story. But, since 99% of the elements of that story - every location, NPC, plots etc - are derived from the DM, in what way is the DM not telling a story?

Let me push back a bit. I’d like to know if this would be considered a story.

Or this?

If I submitted either of these to a literature professor for a short story assignment, I’d get an F for not understanding the assignment. They contain no plot, no character arc, no narrative progression, just a description.

Now, to be fair, there are stories in my material, but they are built later, as lore. For example, I take something like this:

550 AU Within the Southlands the nomadic Shonkor tribe is killed by their rivals the Torgil tribe. A young man named Kugan escapes into the desert.
563 AU Kugan and his band of outlaws learn to ride griffons attack the Torgil and their allies.
568 AU Kugan is crowned as the Tengeriin Khan (the Sky King).
580 AU The Tengeriin Khan’s empire extends across the Southlands.
596 AU Khepramesu, a son of Sarrath, kills the Tengeriin Khan and scatters his armies.
598 AU Mantriv’s wrath descends on the Southlands. Khepramesu is beheaded by Mantriv. The battle forms the Sky Mantle mountains and creates Ironedge Chasm.

And turn it into a story later

The Sky King and Mantriv's Wrath​

The Southlands are dominated by the Forsaken Desert and the steppes and plains that surround it. This vast region is home to a megafauna of monsters such as ankhegs, bulettes, chimerae, dragonnes, and various giant plains beasts. According to legend, the goddess Kalis, in her form as the Night Hag, gives birth to these monsters to create beings capable of battling demons. The nomadic tribes of the region pray to Mantriv, the Thunder Lord, and his wife, Dannu, hoping to safeguard themselves from the Night Hag’s spawn.

Although the Southlands lie beyond the bounds of civilization, the upheaval caused by the Shattering eventually reached them. Adventurers and refugees from the remnants of the Bright Empire ventured into the region, disrupting the balance of power among the tribes.

For two generations, the tribes fought among themselves. Around 550 AU, the Shonkor (Falcon) tribe was annihilated at the hands of their rivals, the Torgil (Iron Wolves). One of the few survivors was a boy named Kugan, who managed to endure the harsh desert for more than a decade, eventually becoming the leader of a band of outlaws.

The Torgil had forsaken Mantriv in favor of the Dragon God, Sarrath, guided by priests from the Ochre Empire. Under their influence, the Torgil began consolidating control over the Southlands.

Fascinated by the griffins dwelling in the Malik Crags deep within the Forsaken Desert, Kugan would often travel there to observe them hunting and nesting among the peaks. During one such visit, he was visited by Altansar, a Valkyrie of Mantriv.

Mantriv was enraged at the Torgil’s actions and their worship of Sarrath. Altansar revealed that Kugan was the Thunder Lord’s chosen champion, destined to unite the remaining tribes, overthrow the Torgil, and purge the Dragon God’s influence from the Southlands. Kugan was told to seek out Thrumadrottin, Mantriv’s Sky Warden to aid him. She would teach him how to tame and ride griffins and thus give his forces an overwhelming advantage.

War spread across the desert and plains. Kugan was crowned the Tengeriin Khan (the Sky King), and with griffin riders at the head of his army, he led them to victory after victory, ultimately destroying the Torgils and their allies. At the height of his power, the Tengeriin Khan ruled an empire extending from Silverwood (the Blood Forest) in the west to the Westwall in the east.

But Sarrath intervened, sending one of his sons Khepramesu, a titan, to lead the surviving forces against the Tengeriin Khan. At the Battle of the Sarduin River, Khepramesu and a host of dragons under Sarrath’s command annihilated the griffon riders and slew the Tengeriin Khan. His army scattered across the steppe, fleeing dragon fire and serpent venom.

Enraged by Sarrath’s direct interference, a colossal storm swept across the plains, scattering the dragons to the four winds. Consumed by wrath, Mantriv descended in a fury of lightning bolts to battle Khepramesu for three days and nights. Mantriv’s cloak tore away during this titanic struggle and fell to the ground, forming the Sky Mantle Mountains. An errant swing of his axe cleaved the desert, leaving a canyon fifty miles long, forming the Ironedge Chasm. Defeated at last, Khepramesu was beheaded by Mantriv, who placed the severed head on the highest peak of what is now called the Titan Head Mountains.

The surviving tribes renamed themselves the Kubar in honor of Kugan, the Tengeriin Khan, renewing their devotion to Mantriv and vowing that the Southlands would remain free forever.

That is a story, a dramatized, character-driven narrative built on top of a timeline of events. It’s something I write to add color and myth to the setting, like Tolkien’s Silmarillion.

Entries like this:

May allude to legendary events, but the location write, up itself isn’t a story. It’s a setting detail.

My setting itself doesn’t tell stories. It provides descriptions, situations, histories, and ongoing developments. Some may become stories when the players interact with them, but prior to that, they are a description of a fictional place that lives only in the imagination.

This isn’t just a semantic debate. It’s about what purpose this material serves in play. I’m building a world for them to act within. If a story emerges, it’s a consequence of their choices and the world’s logic responding to them.

That's why I say I'm not a storyteller. I'm a setting designer and referee. What happens next? That’s what the players decide. And maybe that becomes the story.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Just asking what the purpose of constraints are, Micah. It doesn’t really have anything to do with trad vs. narrativism.

If you can understand the purpose of constraint on the players, it seems odd to me that you can’t apply that reasoning to the GM, too.



It’s what helps make a game more character focused.

I don't see how that benefits the GM, which is what I asked.

 

[gban007]

Can’t you ask the GM and possibly the other players these questions

I think you can to an extent, but potentially could be on different pages on what terms mean and think on same page, so isn't perfect.
Certainly has made me more aware of questions I could have asked in the past to have either better feel ahead of how campaign would go, or in one case possibly given me red flag to not play in that group, depending on how self aware that GM was on how the game would turn out.
Certainly been some time since joined a new group vs just being in existing group, but when younger I was more naive, and didn't realise the various ways even just dnd 2nd edition could be played, to know to ask.

 

[AlViking]

Oh wow, quoting Incredibles and not understanding the meaning of the quote.

Sorry, story has a pretty simple definition - plot, character, setting. That's a story. Six words is a story. So, yes, when you have bandits raiding caravans arriving at the location where your PC's are, that's a story. It's 100% a story, and since you, the DM wrote all of it, that makes you the story teller. And, nothing about "raiders are attacking caravans" is based on the "logic of the setting". That's a convenient fiction. Raiders are attacking caravans because it would be an interesting adventure and would make a good story.

Except the GM doesn't write 100% of the story. It's not a story until the characters interact with the raiders. Do they confront them? Fight? Bribe? Scare the off? I guarantee that on a very regular basis things do not go as I thought they would. The monk slaps the military commander, they negotiate with the pirates, sneak past the guards.

I just get so frustrated with all this pretense and hiding. Why be coy about what we are doing? I don't understand the purpose of deliberately trying to mystify what DM's do. We create stuff for the game for the players to do. That's generally why we create stuff. We don't write out entire towns that we know the players will never see. Why would we? We might, if we're really energetic, write a paragraph about the town, more as a place holder than anything else. But, as soon as the players come to that town? Poof, all those people start getting nailed down. All those characters, plot and setting get created. Factions, motivations, whatever. All in the service to the players having something to play with.

Even when the players are driving - the players decide to open a tavern. 100% player driven right? But, then the local thieves guild starts leaning on them for protection money, a mysterious smell is coming from one of the rooms, a murder happens in the basement, a ghost haunts the outhouse. All 100% generated by the DM, not because of any notions of "logic of the setting" but because we actually want to have a fun game.

I'm not hiding anything. I just don't agree with you. I may have a living world and to a certain degree I do write parts of the story, but it only really comes to life when the players get involve. Then the story happens.