Why I Hate Skills

[Gorgon Zee]

The inability of the general flow of OSR style play to handle party splitting has always been an issue.

Is this a problem if that's obvious? Like, definitely there's some issues with forced party splitting that constrain adventure design, but if it's clear that it's a bad idea, players should just learn not to do it.

It's a very gamist way of playing, which is fine for many people. But it often feels like an artificial constraint imposed by the game system.

As an example, if I'm in a group that is attending a fancy dress ball and I'm playing AD&D, if a guest invites me to head out alone with them to see his collection of etchings, I'm immediately thinking "if this turns into a combat encounter I'm screwed" because the system says that I'm 200 feet from my friends which is 4 turns of movement -- and that's if they hear my screams through the negative penalties of a party atmosphere and 10 feet of stone walls. However, if I'm playing a system focused on representing the genre more than trying to simulate reality, I'm not as worried, because it's very genre-appropriate to scream for help and have my friends arrive to rescue me in one round.

So in OSR style games you end up playing a very specific genre which is partly based on fantasy stories, but also partly based on detailed rules knowledge that requires you to meta-game, or die.

 

[Pedantic]

I also think that "the answer is not on your character sheet" thing is part of it. When the solution is on your character sheet...when a player is invoking an ability/spell/item that belongs to their character...then I think there is going to be a tendency to view the solution as an individual action. But when you're looking around the table saying, "What do we do?" it's going to tend to be more of a group solution.

I think I disagree. I suspect it's got much more to do with how variable the costs and impacts are between the group collective total of actions available. Skill checks (without defined actions connected to them) are either free or set at whatever fixed cost taking any action at all will have (i.e. the risk of accumulating a failure in a 4e skill challenge). You're either paying nothing (the "everyone rolls perception" situation) or the cost to act is fixed (or maybe just not very granular, I'm not sure 2 levels is actually much better), and as I said earlier are often designed around fixed action costs, where every PC has to put in the same action expenditure.

When you're looking at more complex cost/impact math, (impact often conveying "how many PCs can overcome the problem per action deployed), then the tactical/strategic depth of decision making is much bigger. What does the rogue risk at 70% chance of success vs. the spell slot? Does the problem remain if we have to retreat? Can we get away with 1 risky swim check vs. everyone doing it easily? Is it worth one or more spells to draw off the dire pike, so we can make the relatively doable swim checks in peace?

My experience of the "group huddle" was often players indicating what abilities they had that seemed relevant, maybe some discussion of what we could afford to spend, and so on.

 

[TwoSix]

I think I disagree. I suspect it's got much more to do with how variable the costs and impacts are between the group collective total of actions available. Skill checks (without defined actions connected to them) are either free or set at whatever fixed cost taking any action at all will have (i.e. the risk of accumulating a failure in a 4e skill challenge). You're either paying nothing (the "everyone rolls perception" situation) or the cost to act is fixed (or maybe just not very granular, I'm not sure 2 levels is actually much better), and as I said earlier are often designed around fixed action costs, where every PC has to put in the same action expenditure.

When you're looking at more complex cost/impact math, (impact often conveying "how many PCs can overcome the problem per action deployed), then the tactical/strategic depth of decision making is much bigger. What does the rogue risk at 70% chance of success vs. the spell slot? Does the problem remain if we have to retreat? Can we get away with 1 risky swim check vs. everyone doing it easily? Is it worth one or more spells to draw off the dire pike, so we can make the relatively doable swim checks in peace?

My experience of the "group huddle" was often players indicating what abilities they had that seemed relevant, maybe some discussion of what we could afford to spend, and so on.

So a similar game space to a co-op game like Pandemic, just with more options and variability.

 

[Fenris-77]

Is this a problem if that's obvious? Like, definitely there's some issues with forced party splitting that constrain adventure design, but if it's clear that it's a bad idea, players should just learn not to do it. I'm put in mind of kinds of rules that come up in some economic board games I like.

I think you're missing the point. There's no real in-setting reason the party shouldn't split up at all, in fact it makes great sense in lots of situations. But the mechanics push back against it hard. Very hard depending on the specific encounter roll mechanic in question. Explaining to the players that yes, that does make sense, but the rules don't like ti is never going to a satisfying answer.

 

[TwoSix]

I think you're missing the point. There's no real in-setting reason the party shouldn't split up at all, in fact it makes great sense in lots of situations. But the mechanics push back against it hard. Very hard depending on the specific encounter roll mechanic in question. Explaining to the players that yes, that does make sense, but the rules don't like ti is never going to a satisfying answer.

The problem is that splitting up is often the most strategic choice ("Let's split up so we can cover more ground" does actually make sense in a lot of situations), but it leads to "at-table" consequences (loss of player attention, more GM overhead, boredom); thus, we turn to rules mechanics or narrative situations to try and curb a rational but unwanted behavior.

 

[Fenris-77]

The problem is that splitting up is often the most strategic choice ("Let's split up so we can cover more ground" does actually make sense in a lot of situations), but it leads to "at-table" consequences (loss of player attention, more GM overhead, boredom); thus, we turn to rules mechanics or narrative situations to try and curb a rational but unwanted behavior.

That is precisely the problem, yes. Teh best strategic choice is one that is penalized, quite severely in some cases, which is IMO a suboptimal outcome at the table.

 

[Pedantic]

It's a very gamist way of playing, which is fine for many people. But it often feels like an artificial constraint imposed by the game system.

As an example, if I'm in a group that is attending a fancy dress ball and I'm playing AD&D, if a guest invites me to head out alone with them to see his collection of etchings, I'm immediately thinking "if this turns into a combat encounter I'm screwed" because the system says that I'm 200 feet from my friends which is 4 turns of movement -- and that's if they hear my screams through the negative penalties of a party atmosphere and 10 feet of stone walls. However, if I'm playing a system focused on representing the genre more than trying to simulate reality, I'm not as worried, because it's very genre-appropriate to scream for help and have my friends arrive to rescue me in one round.

So in OSR style games you end up playing a very specific genre which is partly based on fantasy stories, but also partly based on detailed rules knowledge that requires you to meta-game, or die.

I agree with your point broadly, but I think we would call exactly the opposite things in that situation "meta-gaming." XD

Knowing the rules allows you to portray a character who lives in the setting. It is actively dangerous to leave your friends if you legitimately think people might try to kill you. All those details about movement and perception are precisely the sorts of things that allow you to make informed decisions, working with the same stuff your character can.

Expecting genre conventions to apply is precisely meta; you are not acting with the understanding a person in the world can have (unless they're some kind of meta-aware bard type, who understandings the dramatic consequences of screaming for help as a player character), but instead with your understanding of how a narrative must evolve in this kind of situation.

 

[Pedantic]

I think you're conflating two different things here, @Fenris-77.

I think you're missing the point. There's no real in-setting reason the party shouldn't split up at all, in fact it makes great sense in lots of situations. But the mechanics push back against it hard. Very hard depending on the specific encounter roll mechanic in question. Explaining to the players that yes, that does make sense, but the rules don't like ti is never going to a satisfying answer.

I would object that whatever the rules model is true, not the other way around. If the players want do something that puts them at a disadvantage mechanically, that is obviously their prerogative, but it's not a conflict. Better rules provide more clarity about the world so they can make the best possible decisions. You're pointing a problem of implementation, not design method. If you don't want it to be a truth that splitting up is dangerous, you can restructure the rules to make it less dangerous and more advantageous.

The problem is that splitting up is often the most strategic choice ("Let's split up so we can cover more ground" does actually make sense in a lot of situations), but it leads to "at-table" consequences (loss of player attention, more GM overhead, boredom); thus, we turn to rules mechanics or narrative situations to try and curb a rational but unwanted behavior.

This is a different concern, about the actual deployment of rules and their resolution at the table. I agree that splitting up parties is harder to resolve and often unpleasantly boring to play through. I personally have no problem with using that as sufficient basis to set stuff up as a design goal; making it dangerous and stupid to split the party because the designer knows split parties are a bad experience even when they are tactically sound is a totally reasonable way to get your design goals.

 

[Fenris-77]

Knowing the rules allows you to portray a character who lives in the setting. It is actively dangerous to leave your friends if you legitimately think people might try to kill you.

Staying in a group and not scouting or taking advantage of the opportunities afforded by splitting the group for things like ambush is also actively dangerous. It's nonsense to claim that staying together is simply a better in-setting option. That's plainly not the case. What's pushing back there are mechanics like encounter rolls per X, not anything setting specific.

 

[Fenris-77]

I would object that whatever the rules model is true, not the other way around.

What an odd thing to say. Moving on I guess.