Maxperson
Morkus from Orkus
I don't think that's in dispute. However, which principals, priorities and constraints matter a great deal to folks, as this thread demonstrates in spades.
D&D General [rant]The conservatism of D&D fans is exhausting.
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Micah Sweet
Level Up & OSR Enthusiast
Perhaps, but the play techniques matter a great deal to some of us.
Enrahim
Explorer
Yes, it is a great move in a skilled play game. But I'm understanding of the word "competative play" is having important differences to "skilled play". I pointed to one essential my post: The assumption of a fully neutral GM.
I also will point out that even if you replace "competative play" with "skilled play", I do not think that adequately describe what I love about TTRPGs. If I want to engage i play I really feel like challenges my skills, I get more of that feeling from various board games.
Sure! In fact, here it is again, with some bolded parts to help you understand it wasn't an absolute truth.
"Yes, actually. Those priorities, though, I have found, are better served through video games like Baldur's Gate, or campaign games like Roll Player Adventures, Tainted Grail, etc. When I made the board game comment above, it wasn't as a perjorative.*
What RPGs can do that can't be replicated by the above is really give the player a chance to inhabit the character, and by so doing, the character's place in the world. To be invested in the fictional world at large. Actually roleplay as a character with their own set of desires, goals, quirks, etc. If it's really good, it carries over to interactions in character amongst the party members.
To then take a group like that and say "Hey Frank, tough luck but no biggie, we'll just resurrect you later or whatever," is just not a response anyone but a psychopath would give if they were actually going through the situation with their friends. I have 4 hours a month I can give to a game and through a bad climbing roll my character dies? THAT's the decision the GM decides a 1 means?
At that point, the message is "Don't get too invested, don't try to inhabit the character, because there's a good mathematical chance you won't see it pay off." And sure, there are games where that can be what it's about, like competitive play, or just mechanically solving the mission, or whatever. It just seems that board games and video games address those priorities better these days; I don't have to personally invest in the character, just play them as a set of mechanics, and see what comes next.
*Edit for additional comment on this: Board game design has come a long way, and it is now rare to find a game where a player can be eliminated from play with a bad roll (or even a series of them); it's understood people showed up to play."
I stand by the psychopath comment; being that cavalier about an ally/friend's death is a hallmark of game logic, and not an approximation of a real, healthy attitude towards the subject matter by an actual person.
Enrahim
Explorer
This is (probably) a misatribution. That being said a post I recently read about similarities between fate compells and wandering monsters have made me contemplating if there are broader parallels between that system, an narrative systems for bringing elements into play. So I do not feel particularly bad with being name droped in this context
Hussar
Legend
Hang on a tick.
How can you roll random events beforehand? What triggers the events? How can you know how long the party will spend on a particular task in order to have time based random events? Or are the events location based - in which case they are 100% quantum. The event only occurs if the party goes to Place A. If they never go there, then the random event doesn't occur, regardless of what you rolled.
In other words, the only way that actually works is if you have a stack of quantum events that you simply pull out of the bag whenever you feel that the criteria for that particular event has been fufilled. You cannot possibly know what rooms they will be going into in the house unless you are leading them around by the nose. SInce you claim that they have complete freedom, then your random events can't be anything other than quantum if/then statements.
Maxperson
Morkus from Orkus
Easy. I know the party is going to be traveling through a forest for three days. So I roll random encounters for all three days prior to the session ever starting. I know what the random encounter will be, when during the day it happens, what direction it is coming from, and so on.
A day is a day. If they are in the forest, the random encounter is happening at 6pm that day, whether they are futzing around looking for herbs or traveling straight through. Random encounters are not preset encounters with a specific location, but rather a specific time. They wander into the group, which is why they are also called wandering monsters.
With regard to the cook, I've established through rolls that she is going to be in the kitchen from X time to Y time, then she is going to bed. If the party shows up during that time period, they will encounter her regardless of their pick locks roll. If the show up outside of that time period, they aren't going to encounter her, even if they fail the roll. She is a preset encounter, not a random one.
Still not quantum, because a preset encounter remains in that location whether they ever go there or not. It's existence is not based on whether the party wanders there.
Nothing about what I am saying is quantum. Nothing is based on whether the party does something or not in order to be in a particular spot or time.
Enrahim
Explorer
I think it might be helpful to seperate between the concept of random encounters and random stocking. It appear to me like what you describe amounts to random stocking using random encounter tables.
In common parlance "random encounter" refers to exactly the procedure of play you say you are not using - making a roll on the spot during play based on some trigger (time passing being the most common, but on loud noise is another classic). So when someone are talking about properties about random encounters, they are not talking about anything that appear relevant for your game; but it is relevant fot a lot of traditional play.
clearstream
(He, Him)
I've slightly lost track of this line of thought. Are tables adduced into an argument that in essence both D&D and AW (or PbtA generally) include quantum chefs? (Encounters with NPCs not prefigured in the fiction, as a result of a roll.) This argument doesn't turn on whether tables indeed supply value to play (so that no more need be said about that.)
One response then has been proposed by @Maxperson, which is that the table is used only because the fiction contains the right conditions. That seems to mirror @pemerton's careful and repeated explanation that the consequences of fail forward (such as a chef) can and ought to be prefigured in the fiction.
Another response, also by @Maxperson (and apologies if I'm misreading) is that tables may also be situation establishing (part of setting up the fiction). I need to reflect on how that stands in relation to the general worry.
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EzekielRaiden
Follower of the Way
No, that's not what I had said, though I was the one who gave the example.
My example was one where the player is fighting in a place where poison gas is present, and they have a random number of turns before it becomes unavoidably lethal but not instant death--so even if they beat their opponent, they may already be "dead" and just not yet knowing that. (If you prefer, you could think of it as radiation exposure rather than poison--something that doesn't kill instantly, but which a sufficient dosage will cause death eventually.)
Not much of a thrill to narrowly survive only to find out "oh, actually you were dead the whole time".
Still seems rather pointedly at odds with your previously-stated stance of "story is exclusively something that happens afterward when we reflect on what happened". Here, you seem to be advocating for mechanical setups which produce a particular experienced story, just with a layer of probability making it so the DM can't be certain of what will result.
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