D&D 4E 4e/13thA immersion question and 5e/13thA DoaM question

[herrozerro]

Speaking of dissociative, you ever going to actually define that term at some point?

It seems to be something that the player knows about the game that the character would have no concept of. like Level, HP, Non-Magical Limits on abilities, Roles, Classes, etc...

But Em's version is pretty interesting, ignoring or making justifications for classic Dissociation mechanics like HP or Level, but using it like a badge of shame against other mechanics like martial encounter or daily powers.

 

[pemerton]

Speaking of dissociative, you ever going to actually define that term at some point?

May I refer you to this epic thread of epicness.

 

[EnglishLanguage]

May I refer you to this epic thread of epicness.

Alexandrian

And there goes my interest.

And my problem with Emerikol's use of it is, like herrozerro said, he uses it as a mark of shame for things Damage on a Miss, but then bends over backwards to insist that things like levels and hit points aren't dissociative in the slightest, making his definition of the world usually amount to "things I don't like."

 

[pemerton]

Alexandrian

And there goes my interest.

<snip>

his definition of the world usually amount to "things I don't like."

Yeah, that's a working summary of 990-something posts, or at least my take on it.

 

[Emerikol]

Alexandrian

And there goes my interest.

And my problem with Emerikol's use of it is, like herrozerro said, he uses it as a mark of shame for things Damage on a Miss, but then bends over backwards to insist that things like levels and hit points aren't dissociative in the slightest, making his definition of the world usually amount to "things I don't like."

Or people are just so obtuse they can't see the difference.

I do though think in terms of hit points that it may be that we prefer different hit point models and that mine is non-dissociative and that yours is dissociative. That might explain the hit point debate. My PCs know about hit points, level, and AC. Level obviously abstractly as in "I can bet that guy or I'm better than so and so." That is all level is. AC is just how hard you are to hit. Most people who fight would know that. Hit points in my definition are proportional meat so you know when you are wounded.

Since they don't bother you, I can't see why so many fight against a useful working definition. There are plenty of things I like which are not dissociative. I often correct people on it actually. Usually people like yourself you equate it with anything I don't like.

 

[EnglishLanguage]

I equate your use of DS with things you don't like because that's exactly how you use it. Your use of it never has consistent logic when you claim things like DoaM are DS but HP in general and levels aren't. *awaits the next angry PM flood*

 

[pemerton]

My PCs know about hit points, level, and AC. Level obviously abstractly as in "I can bet that guy or I'm better than so and so." That is all level is. AC is just how hard you are to hit. Most people who fight would know that. Hit points in my definition are proportional meat so you know when you are wounded.

Level is extremely weird as an ingame element, especially if you also treat spell levels as ingame elements, but I'll leave that one alone.

"AC is just how hard you are to hit"? But isn't the fighter with 10 DEX in full plate easier to strike than the unarmoured thief with 18 DEX, or the unarmoured monk with AC 2 from special abilities? Now, of course "hit" in the technical language of D&D combat is not synonymous with "strike", but you can't explain that non-synonymy without using other notions, like "damage", that also involve game elements with no obvious ingame analogue (eg hit points).

So turning to hit points: I understand what it is to hack meat of a souvlaki skewer, slice by slice. How that metaphor is meant to extend to interpersonal combat I have no idea, however. If a PC has 16 hit points, and takes 4 hp of damage from a dagger, what does s/he know about him-/herself? How can a quarter of his/her body be missing yet s/he suffer no ill effects to her physical endeavours?

And if you don't mean literal proportionality, then the whole thing breaks down. If 16 hp of damage to that PC is the piercing of a lung, or the heart, what is 4 hp? A finger chopped off? (But you can take 4 hp more than 10 times in your life, and no matter how many times you take it you can still write and play the lute.) A scratch along the forearm? But now what has happened to proportionality? And what if the blow that kills a character is the blow that does 4 hp? No matter how badly hurt in other ways, a person is not going to die from a scratch along the forearm that, had s/he taken it in an uninjured state, would have had no adverse effect on his/her physical performance.

It seems to me that Gygax was just writing common sense when he told us that hit points, AC and the action economy were all abstractions, that do not in themselves correspond in any systematic way to ingame events, but that perform the function of regulating ingame outcomes. Plenty of RPGers didn't like that style, and hence took up games like Runequest, Rolemaster and the like. (For many years I was one of them.) As far as I can tell, the label "dissociated mechanics" is simply a pejorative label for an abstracted mechanic that the labeller, for whatever reason, doesn't enjoy.

The most "dissociated" mechanic I've actually come across in recent times is the 3E Mirror Image spell, which came under scrutiny in this thread. Mirror image is a spell that made sense in AD&D - it represented the caster creating these confusing images within the chaos of melee. But 3E, with it's stop-motion initiative and its freedom of targeting, makes no attempt to model the chaos of melee. Which means that Mirror Image ends up making no sense if you try to treat it as modelling any ingame process.

TL;DR: I agree with [MENTION=6774827]EnglishLanguage[/MENTION] about the unhelpfulness of the label "dissociated mechanics", and am seriously puzzled by anyone who can stomach 3E Mirror Image being unable to digest DoaM (or CaGI, for that matter).

 

[Emerikol]

Level is extremely weird as an ingame element, especially if you also treat spell levels as ingame elements, but I'll leave that one alone.

Actually I've always referred to spells by scroll. So a ninth level spell is on the ninth scroll. These "scrolls" represent the original magic handed down from the elves. New spells are often referenced as belonging on this scroll or that scroll. It's really easy.

TL;DR: I agree with @EnglishLanguage about the unhelpfulness of the label "dissociated mechanics", and am seriously puzzled by anyone who can stomach 3E Mirror Image being unable to digest DoaM (or CaGI, for that matter).

Damage on a miss isn't as written a dissociative mechanic. That is the problem with just lumping everything I don't like into one category. I do not like inspirational hit points either but again that is not a dissociative mechanic either.

There are three major concerns for me and my playstyle
1. Dissociative mechanics - fate points, action points, martial dailies, rigid encounters, and so forth. Basically not actor stance.
2. Hit points - Inspiration vs proportional meat.
3. Simulation/Process Simulation

While people who dislike certain things may often agree on those three issues they are not the same thing. They overlap (simulation is anti-dissociative mechanics but not everything anti-sim is dissociative. Dissociative is a subcategory) in some cases. I like to highlight dissociative mechanics because they are easy to identify and avoid in most cases.

DoaM violates process simulation for sure. It may flirt with violating hit points as proportional meat. It has nothing to do though with dissociative mechanics.

If you bothered to really understand the definition which is clear, you would find dissociative mechanics as a specific label a useful way to communicate. That does not mean you have to dislike them. Many people love them. The dissociative label applies to the character mechanic disconnect and not to any effect it has on the player.

 

[Campbell]

The disassociated mechanics language is problematic because the entire essay and subsequent reworking is an attempt to other substantial portions of the community. Justin Alexander goes on to claim that any game with a single "disassociated mechanic" is in fact not a real role playing game. By his standards not even 3e passes the test for role playing (monk stunning fist, barbarian rage, and some high level rogue abilities). Count in every World of Darkness game, Shadowrun, half the editions of RuneQuest, etc. It's a divisive purity test that pretty much leaves only old school RuneQuest and Traveller left standing.

 

[pemerton]

If you bothered to really understand the definition which is clear, you would find dissociative mechanics as a specific label a useful way to communicate.

I refer you back to the thread I linked to about half-a-dozen posts upthread.

I understand the "definition" very well: "dissociated mechanics" = metagame mechanics that Justin Alexander doesn't like.

Associated with the so-called theory are empirical claims about the connection between those mechanics, and the psychological experience of playing a game, which are false. I know they're false because I have personally witnessed and experienced counter-instances. For example, powers like the War Devil's "beseiged foe" are ostensibly "dissociated", and hence unable to be used while roleplaying or immersing - but I know from my own play experience that this is not true, and that players can both deploy and interact with abilities of this sort without breaking first-person narration or character immersion.

I'm prepared to believe the essay as a piece of autobiography - that is, Justin Alexander is not able to use such mechanics while roleplaying - but nothing of broader consequence follows from that biographical oddity.