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

[Pedantic]

Something I've noticed and read testimony to here is that it doesn't work for some players to explore what they invent. So there could be some engagement and suspension of disbelief set backs for those players. I don't count myself among them. Perhaps relatedly, I've noticed some players struggle with a loss of validity when they are tasked to both invent and resolve some conflict in respect of a setting element.

I've found that folk can overcome these set backs with acclimation... albeit perseverance in doing so relies on a player's belief in its value. It does seem that a sense of mystery (and surprise, perhaps) is changed and often lost through being the inventing party.

I think that rather necessarily simplifies that "resolution" down to a pretty limited play space. Hard to have a seven step plan if you're inventing the opposition one step at a time, though I don't know if I've seen a game that actually separates content creation and interaction into separate tools and systems without separating them into different people.

 

[Old Fezziwig]

To my mind, some setting/lore is story and/or plot.

For instance, if the backstory includes one or more PCs being on a particular trajectory (say, they are "chosen ones", or the village is under attack and the PCs are the villagers' only hope) then I think that is pretty close to a story or plot.

But some lore/setting is not a story plot. For instance, Hardby is a fantasy city with docks, and shady merchants, and thieves, and a wizard's cabal; and its ruler is a magic-using Gynarch is not really a story or a plot.

I do think that emergent story, as opposed to largely pre-established story, needs space for contributions to connect, interact and yield the emergent. Which I think is what @Hussar has in mind.

I'm with you about Hardby is a fantasy city... being neither story nor plot and about the need for space for emergent story.

But I'm not sure about the first example -- I think, at best, it's a situation with an implied or explicit backstory that could turn into a story or be the germ of a plot, which may or may not be close to a story or plot. To me, its value is that it's suggestive of possible stories or plots in the same way that a man-eating shark terrorizes vacationers and locals during the high season or a nightclub owner comes into possession of letters of transit in wartime Morocco is (or could be, at least, if the stories that came out of those situations weren't so famous), but there's no theme or idea in either of them. We could tell different stories about different things from all three of these starting points.

 

[JConstantine]

Let's begin with this: suppose that the players did invent every important setting element. How would that set back play?

I think the immediately obvious one would be that it potentially results in an incoherent setting. The more constraints and consensus there is the less likely that is to happen. And, obviously, it can still happen with a single GM deciding it all, but the more people contributing to it, the more disparate the various elements are going to be, and as such the more incoherent it's likely to be.

 

[thefutilist]

I've grown to really value the combination of meta-channel openness and atmosphere of inquiry the games engines I'm currently running expect for this. My players often pause and like, step through their reasoning of why their character is about to do something - or if it's a PC to PC conversation may go like "you probably expected Sol to do X here, but then his expression twists and you can tell he's remembering that moment his ricochets hit Aodhan before he turns away muttering "no, never mind - you go on ahead." Like, that's so cool! We get to see how the consequences (game term) turn into character consequences (roleplaying/soft), and maybe get baked into mechanics again (memories-> adjusting beliefs).

I've done some experimenting over the past few years and I currently break down character's intentions into: meta-channel, first person dialogue, inner monologue, third person description (no dialogue but convey the meaning of what is said).

Third person descriptive + meta-channel was more effective than any of the other but it does come at a cost in color. Triggering conflict rolls directly off something said in first person is the most aesthetically fulfilling but also fragile and probably not suited to all interactions, it's game dependant.


So I did a game in third person a while back and one of the first scenes was something along the lines of:

A warlord has suddenly started feeling guilt and it's put him in a dire position because he's at the head of a horde about to invade a Kingdom.

His son, who has not yet gained glory in battle goes to speak to him. He pleads with his father to attack, he says that he has not yet had a chance to gain honour. That the warlord is denying him the chance the warlord himself had when they were younger.

So that triggers a conflict between two of the warlords priorities. The ascendant priority is his longing for peace, the lower priority is his best wishes for his children.

We roll the dice. 'Best wishes' wins and becomes ascendant.

The warlord sighs, despite the guilt he can't deny his son what should be his. Tormented and cursed he orders his armies to war.


It's obviously very in your face but it's also very effective.

 

[JConstantine]

Something I've noticed and read testimony to here is that it doesn't work for some players to explore what they invent. So there could be some engagement and suspension of disbelief set backs for those players. I don't count myself among them. Perhaps relatedly, I've noticed some players struggle with a loss of validity when they are tasked to both invent and resolve some conflict in respect of a setting element.

I've found that folk can overcome these set backs with acclimation... albeit perseverance in doing so relies on a player's belief in its value. It does seem that a sense of mystery (and surprise, perhaps) is changed and often lost through being the inventing party.

That sense of the unknown is important to some people. It is like spoilers in other mediums. I recall a study was done on film spoilers, and it (surprisingly, to me) found that a slight majority (maybe a plurality), actually had their enjoyment increased by spoilers due to the anticipation of seeing it in context, but there was still a notable amount whose enjoyment was severely negatively impacted by them because of that loss of surprise.

 

[Bedrockgames]

I think the immediately obvious one would be that it potentially results in an incoherent setting. The more constraints and consensus there is the less likely that is to happen. And, obviously, it can still happen with a single GM deciding it all, but the more people contributing to it, the more disparate the various elements are going to be, and as such the more incoherent it's likely to be.

Even beyond these style issues this was one of my frustrations with the 3E era of D&D. I liked 3E, but the zeitgeist was very much of it is in a supplement the players expect to be able to use it. So you would get class combos or strange races that disrupted your sense of your own setting

 

[robertsconley]

There are plenty of people in these threads (@robertsconley @Lanefan @Micah Sweet) who have said game designers should not design games that change up the normative roles.

I’d appreciate it if you didn’t attribute a position to me unless you reference a direct quote. As it stands, this misrepresents my views.

I’ve stated clearly and consistently, here, on my blog, and in other forums, that what I describe is a way to approach tabletop roleplaying, not the way. My focus is on presenting methods that support specific creative goals.

 

[JConstantine]

I am just not a big pixar or animation guy. My wife has to drag me to watch stuff like this

If you haven't already, might I suggest giving Blue Eye Samurai a try. The subject matter is close enough to wuxia that it might help alleviate some of the dislike.

 

[thefutilist]

I think that rather necessarily simplifies that "resolution" down to a pretty limited play space. Hard to have a seven step plan if you're inventing the opposition one step at a time, though I don't know if I've seen a game that actually separates content creation and interaction into separate tools and systems without separating them into different people.

Because I'm GNS brained I obviously have a cognitive bias but I see defence of technique as (often) related to it's necessity for functional play for a given agenda.


So you can't share content authority in Gamism because of planning (and execution as well really)

Meta-currencies, in Gamism, can get in the way of diegetic play space.

Control of character is necessary for player skill

and so on.


Now there's probably critiques of all that stuff (some really good ones imo) but I'm not really bothered what gamists do.

 

[Bedrockgames]

If you haven't already, might I suggest giving Blue Eye Samurai a try. The subject matter is close enough to wuxia that it might help alleviate some of the dislike.

I can't even get into that stuff. I used to watch Anime when I was younger, but I find I can't really get into animated stuff these days