D&D 4E 4E: DM-proofing the game

[Hussar]

I am a huge fan of 1E. I think dice rolls are for things that can't be negotiated at the table. You know how the thief sucked at low levels in earlier editions -- 20% to find or remove traps, for example? Well, that's because those numbers only mattered if the player said, "I search for traps." more often, even finding and/or disarming a trap was a negotiation -- I look here, I pull this, Can you draw it so I know what it looks like. Stuff like that. Essentially, any part of the game that *can* be handled through player/DM negotiation is better handled that way.

Twenty some years of playing. Multiple groups spanning every continent on the planet excluding Antarctica. Not ONCE have I ever seen a player ask the DM to draw out a trap. Nor, before this, have I even heard of this happening at the table.

Back in the day, the trap was, "Opening the door springs the darts". Nothing was ever detailed regarding the actual mechanics of the traps in any official adventures or sources. The DM rolled your Find Traps roll and then rolled your Remove Traps if you found one. End of story.

 

[pemerton]

How? You keep saying this is the case, but I haven't seen you actually explain how the DM loses anything. Saying the player's get more narrative power, as far as it concerns their character, is not an explanation of how the DM is supposedly losing anything.

I tried to explain this in a couple of posts upthread (from the perspective of a 4e proponent, not opponent). In summary: if the mechanics (be they action resolution mechanics, encounter building mechanics, or whatever) are tighter, then the GM has less room for adjudication and less excuse for fudging, that is, less narrative control; if the gameworld put forward in the edition eliminates elements that licence the GM to exercise narrative control (like alignment) and introudces assumptions that players have a say in the incidence of adversity (like PoL as expounded in the sidebar on p 20 of W&M), then the GM has less narrative control.

To an extent, narrative control really is a zero sum game, because any given game element is either in state X or is not, and if the players are empowered by the game to decide that it is in state X, then the GM has lost the power to say that it is not.

 

[apoptosis]

I tried to explain this in a couple of posts upthread (from the perspective of a 4e proponent, not opponent). In summary: if the mechanics (be they action resolution mechanics, encounter building mechanics, or whatever) are tighter, then the GM has less room for adjudication and less excuse for fudging, that is, less narrative control; if the gameworld put forward in the edition eliminates elements that licence the GM to exercise narrative control (like alignment) and introudces assumptions that players have a say in the incidence of adversity (like PoL as expounded in the sidebar on p 20 of W&M), then the GM has less narrative control.

To an extent, narrative control really is a zero sum game, because any given game element is either in state X or is not, and if the players are empowered by the game to decide that it is in state X, then the GM has lost the power to say that it is not.

I would say rules to handle social conflicts (what people I think mistakenly confuse with roleplaying) are also evidence of this.

I would add a third axis to the power though. System power (like the random wanderign prostitute tables and the NPC interaction tables from 1E)

 

[pemerton]

I would say rules to handle social conflicts (what people I think mistakenly confuse with roleplaying) are also evidence of this.

Agreed.

I would add a third axis to the power though. System power (like the random wanderign prostitute tables and the NPC interaction tables from 1E)

Also agreed. Though D&D has always had a hard time trying to decide whether these system elements are really meant to be determinative, or are guidelines waivable by the GM if s/he has an alternative preference. This is one instance, I think, of D&D's general hesitation in labelling its worldbuilding presuppositions as part of the rules.

 

[The Little Raven]

Er...pardon what may sound like a dumb question, but why would a non-roleplayer be playing a roleplaying game? For such this is, at its core; a face-to-face form of human social interaction around an ongoing story, without a script and ad-libbed all the way. Those who are better at ad-libbing are, one hopes, going to either design their characters around such or back off when the talking starts.

Some non-roleplayers play because they like games of probability dressed up in an appealing and familiar genre as part of what they do with their friends. Their characters aren't memorable outside of their actions in combat mostly, but they have fun playing the game without getting into the roleplaying aspect. Some are former Magic players, and like the tactical aspect, but don't want to be creative. I welcome pretty much anyone at my table, regardless of ability to roleplay or not, as long as they can behave like a civilized human being. Some of my players say maybe three words in character, some are constantly in character. I strive to pull some non-roleplayers into roleplaying, but it's their choice.

 

[The Little Raven]

I tried to explain this in a couple of posts upthread (from the perspective of a 4e proponent, not opponent). In summary: if the mechanics (be they action resolution mechanics, encounter building mechanics, or whatever) are tighter, then the GM has less room for adjudication and less excuse for fudging, that is, less narrative control; if the gameworld put forward in the edition eliminates elements that licence the GM to exercise narrative control (like alignment) and introudces assumptions that players have a say in the incidence of adversity (like PoL as expounded in the sidebar on p 20 of W&M), then the GM has less narrative control.

To an extent, narrative control really is a zero sum game, because any given game element is either in state X or is not, and if the players are empowered by the game to decide that it is in state X, then the GM has lost the power to say that it is not.

Oh, I see.

This is based on the "DM as adversary" approach, isn't it? It seems to assume some sort of "power struggle" between the DM and players to determine the outcome, whether rule resolutions or narrative "control." I guess if that's how you see things, you could perceive the further empowerment of players as a loss.

I favor the "DM as head storyteller" approach. I'm not losing power, I'm sharing duties to make things easier on me and more rewarding for them. Viewing it that way, I see it as a win-win situation all around.

 

[Lanefan]

I favor the "DM as head storyteller" approach. I'm not losing power, I'm sharing duties to make things easier on me and more rewarding for them. Viewing it that way, I see it as a win-win situation all around.

I've DMed far too many players who wouldn't know a story if it walked up and hit them...witness the various times after a treasury division when the party's heading back into the field where I've said "you know, I really don't have anything planned, what do you want to do next?" and got back a round of blank stares...which means, most of the time I as DM have to drive the story if it's to go anywhere at all.

What this has taught me is that as a player I should try to drive the story a bit more when it looks like we're drifting...of course, all this does (as happened recently) is risk throwing the DM for a loop; he'd pretty much planned for us to take path x and I steered us along path y instead...

Lanefan

 

[pemerton]

This is based on the "DM as adversary" approach, isn't it? It seems to assume some sort of "power struggle" between the DM and players to determine the outcome, whether rule resolutions or narrative "control." I guess if that's how you see things, you could perceive the further empowerment of players as a loss.

I favor the "DM as head storyteller" approach. I'm not losing power, I'm sharing duties to make things easier on me and more rewarding for them. Viewing it that way, I see it as a win-win situation all around.

Not necessarily "GM as adversary" - in narrativist play, for example, the GM should be trying to facilitate the players' ability to make the thematic statements they wish to make.

That's one reason why I talked about "narrative control", to make it fairly explicit what I'm referring to. I'm not talking about a competition for fun, I'm talking about who gets to control the events in the gameworld. Letting the players do more of that, and the GM less, may well be win-win in terms of playing pleasure, but it is still a transfer of narrative control from GM to players.

 

[Reynard]

Twenty some years of playing. Multiple groups spanning every continent on the planet excluding Antarctica. Not ONCE have I ever seen a player ask the DM to draw out a trap. Nor, before this, have I even heard of this happening at the table.

Back in the day, the trap was, "Opening the door springs the darts". Nothing was ever detailed regarding the actual mechanics of the traps in any official adventures or sources. The DM rolled your Find Traps roll and then rolled your Remove Traps if you found one. End of story.

Obviously you experiences must be proof, then. In other words, I am not wrong because I have had it happen. Not only that, but there has been trap-detailing supplements for D&D since the game was invented.

 

[king_ghidorah]

Twenty some years of playing. Multiple groups spanning every continent on the planet excluding Antarctica. Not ONCE have I ever seen a player ask the DM to draw out a trap. Nor, before this, have I even heard of this happening at the table.

Back in the day, the trap was, "Opening the door springs the darts". Nothing was ever detailed regarding the actual mechanics of the traps in any official adventures or sources. The DM rolled your Find Traps roll and then rolled your Remove Traps if you found one. End of story.

I have to support Reynard here. I have been playing for 26 years, and I did have 1st edition groups where we talked about how we searched for traps and secret doors, perhaps influenced by the fact that some things (like the example of play in the DMG) did have this as en example. We didn't ask for a drawing of the trap or the door mechanism, but we did talk about where we searched and how. "I think that based on where we have been, that wall seems like it might have a secret door. I tap along the wall about waist height with the pommel of my dagger, listening for hollow sounds," or "I check the area around the handles of the chest for needles, look at the hinges to see if anything looks shady, and tap on the chest gently to see if anything sounds strange" might have come from players at my table back in the 1st edition days.

Whether that was a better way to play or not is a matter of taste, but there were definitely groups that played that way before and I'm sure ones that do still.