A GMing telling the players about the gameworld is not like real life

[pemerton]

I don't know? I was responding to your statements concerning the use of shallow.

Upthread a couple of posters asserted that, in discussing RPGs, we should always use the descriptions that participants themselves use.

That's not a norm that obtains in other fields of criticism. Why should it obtain in RPGs?

Of course you don't normally start a discussion with a creator by asking "Why did you write such a shallow work?" But no one is suggesting otherwise, and this thread is not an example of such a thing.

 

[lowkey13]

*Deleted by user*

 

[Lanefan]

A concrete example: a player declares I cast Dimension Door. The GM responds Nothing happens (because the GM has made a determination that the area that the PC is in is teleport warded). It seems to me that most of the time, in this sort of case, the player has intended to change the fiction in way X (now my PC is here rather than there) but the GM has, by his/her approach to adjudication, rendered what the player did into a discovery of the paremeters/content of the fiction. From the GM's point of view, s/he is facilitating the player's exploration of the fiction. But from the point of view of the player, who was not setting out to explore the fiction but rather was hoping to change it, this may well be experienced as a rather striking case of GM decides.

Before starting to change something, doesn't it make sense to explore it first and figure out what you're trying to change and why? To learn the parameters of your in-fiction surroundings, and of the situation at hand?

And then isn't it reasonable to first determine what means and methods of change, of those you have available to you in the fiction, have better chances of success* before just diving in?

* - and this determination can and often will include some trial and error, a fine example of which is the Dimension Door bit quoted above. If the PCs have no way of knowing they've just entered a teleport no-fly zone, this is how they find out.

Whether or not this sort of case, in which the player who was hoping to change the fiction discovers that s/he is really exploring it, is a problem will obviously be something that varies from table to table. That it might be a problem I think is obvious.

How exploration in an RPG can ever be a problem rather boggles the mind, given as exploration is one of the three** key pillars*** of the game.

** - or four, if downtime is included as a pillar
*** - and though it took 5e D&D to codify this, the principles this codification are based on - that an RPG consists in varying measures of social interaction, exploration, and combat - are nigh-universal.

 

[Bedrockgames]

In literary or cinematic criticism, it is not "below the belt" to call a work shallow (for instance) just because those who authored it, or those who enjoy it, don't agree.

More generally, it is not considered out of bounds to use descriptions, including harsh descriptions, that some authors and audiences would reject.

As far as "mockery" is concerned, all I will do is reiterate that the OP in this thread does not use the term "Mother may I", and I have consistently throughout this thread used the phrase GM decides, except when the context of response to another poster who has used the phrase "Mother may I" requires using it in retur (and then I have almost always used quote marks to signal that the terms in not one that I am unproblematically introducing into the conversation).

I am of two minds on this front. On the one hand, I can see how this should be the case with literary and cinematic criticism, since it sort of straddles analysis and review, and a lot of it is based on how we react to what we see or read. On the other hand, I've been reading a lot of film criticism and analysis lately for wuxia, but I come from a history background. And just as an outsider, I find some of this kind of thing a bit perplexing, and I find it is often hard to get the sort of concrete information I am looking for at times (I guess I just find some of the analysis very flowery, but not very grounded in something I can make use of). Again, I am coming at it as an outsider, so maybe I am just missing something.

That said, I think we are talking about analyzing game design. To me that is almost more of an engineering issue. We are trying to understand why people like different modes of play, what systems and mechanics work, what don't, what mechanics are good for what approaches, etc. Obviously people also have their own subjective opinions about gaming. My contention though has been that a term like Mother May I, clearly is going to make exploration of that harder. I get that sometimes it is said with humor. Ron Edwards recently did a series of videos on sandboxes, and I think he called them Kitty Boxes or litter boxes. I chuckled when I first saw it, because it is a clever thing to say. But I think the effect it had was, the actual points he was trying to make about sandboxes (which I didn't agree with, but he did have sound points that warranted a response) were not really heeded by anyone in the sandbox camp (because the label he chose was so dismissive). I think at the same time, it kind of clouds our ability to understand why people like something when we choose these sorts of labels. You can be critical of an adventure structure, but if you are going to be critical of it, you should probably really understand why people use it in the first place and why they keep using it. Calling GM Decides mother may I, I don't see how it helps to understand what is driving that kind of play at all. Whereas keeping it as a term for a failed state of play, makes total sense (because failed states of play are undesirable and mother may I is undesirable--no one wants a game of Mother May I when they play RPGs).

I appreciate it if you haven't been using Mother May I. I was under the impression you had, but I apparently just assumed that. I will say though, the OP was launched because I was making that point to demonstrate this playstyle wasn't mother may I. So I think we were still grappling with that disagreement over the course of this thread.

 

[Manbearcat]

To further lengthen this post, I aso want to say something about free kriegsspiel, which [MENTION=463]S'mon[/MENTION] in particular has talked about in this thread; and it connects also to a discussion with [MENTION=6688277]Sadras[/MENTION] upthread.

In a RPG where the GM has already pre-established important, salient parts of the fiction - a dungeon map and its key is the paradigm of this; a wildereness map is another example - then some "action declarations" don't really constitute attempts to change the fiction in way X. They're really more like attempts to learn the content and parameters of the fiction as already decided by the GM. For this reason, the concept of GM decides is (in my view) not really even applicable to them.

Just a quick chime-in to append the phrase in order to work toward achieving the game's win condition to the end of:

attempts to learn the content and parameters of the fiction as already decided by the GM

 

[Maxperson]

You are right, infact I see that here people tend to concentrate on simple action dec, which I see as a symptom of a broader attitude.

If a Gm in a game I play just says No, I can argue and explain that my declaration is legit; what I cannot do is change the concretized habit; the consolidated assumption that if the Gm loosen the reins the campaign will collapse. Or that immersion is broken and continuity is compromised if we speed up a bit skipping fill-in stuff, or change approach to the course of play.

The use of Force can be explicit (uber Npc, impossibile obstacles), or implicit (nothing interesting seems to happen around the Pc until the next plot twist from above).

This post seems to presume that everyone wants to play the way you play. That's simply not the case. A lot of people enjoy the traditional playstyle where the DM has more control and they don't want the reins loostened, or to skip the "fill-in stuff." Hell, they don't even see it as "fill-in stuff." That's a preference of yours, and a lot of people enjoy playing that way, too.

 

[Maxperson]

This claim is not true, except in the completely uninteresting sense that any participant in a game might try and cheat, or try and get away with fudging or whining or lobbying for do-overs, or threaten to tip over the board if s/he doesn't get his her way.

It's absolutely true. If I buy Burning Wheel, I have full authority to create house rules for it, including altering the game to give me the same level of DM authority that D&D has. I can then seek players for my Burning Wheel game. I will likely not find many(or maybe not any), but I can do it.

The short one is that I think [MENTION=16814]Ovinomancer[/MENTION] may have in mind the following (from p 3 of the 5e Basic PDF):

The players describe what they want to do. . . .

Sometimes, resolving a task is easy. If an adventurer wants to walk across a room and open a door, the DM might just say that the door opens and describe what lies beyond. But the door might be locked, the floor might hide a deadly trap, or some other circumstance might make it challenging for an adventurer to complete a task. In those cases, the DM decides what happens, often relying on the roll of a die to determine the results . . .

The DM narrates the results of the adventurers’ actions.​

One reading of this is that it is always open to the GM to decide whether or not the PC makes it behind the tree.

One reading, but not the correct reading. The correct reading is that the PC goes behind the tree and the DM narrates the results of that such as, "You step behind the tree and you see a waterfall that you had previously not noticed due to the tree blocking your view."

If there are a couple ways to read a rule and one requires that you be a jerk and one doesn't, the one requiring you to be a jerk is wrong.

(And I have a memory of you arguing as much in a thread we both participated in not too long ago.)

I have never argued that I have total control over the PCs actions.

 

[Maxperson]

Do I need to reiterate it again?

This is from the OP where you quote yourself saying the following.

If a group doesn't want Mother May I, but does want hunting down sect members to be part of play, then it makes sense to choose a system that will facilitate this. (As @chaochou suggested in his post.)

Very clearly that is your discussing the playstyle as "Mother May I." Then you quote [MENTION=85555]Bedrockgames[/MENTION] disagreeing with you that it's Mother May I. You don't get to dodge your saying the playstyle is "Mother May I" just because it was in a quote of yours from the previous thread and you didn't repeat it in the new text for this thread.

 

[Ovinomancer]

This post seems to presume that everyone wants to play the way you play. That's simply not the case. A lot of people enjoy the traditional playstyle where the DM has more control and they don't want the reins loostened, or to skip the "fill-in stuff." Hell, they don't even see it as "fill-in stuff." That's a preference of yours, and a lot of people enjoy playing that way, too.

Awesome. I'm running 5e pretty much by the book right now, so, clearly, I don't have a problem with D&D. That you can enjoy a playstyle doesn't mean that playstyle doesn't have warts. You clearly have no problems saying so about other styles.

 

[Ovinomancer]

It's absolutely true. If I buy Burning Wheel, I have full authority to create house rules for it, including altering the game to give me the same level of DM authority that D&D has. I can then seek players for my Burning Wheel game. I will likely not find many(or maybe not any), but I can do it.

You would actually be violating the rules of that game if you do this.

The point you're so adeptly missing is that D&D puts control over the rules under the GM as a rule of the game. BW does not.

One reading, but not the correct reading. The correct reading is that the PC goes behind the tree and the DM narrates the results of that such as, "You step behind the tree and you see a waterfall that you had previously not noticed due to the tree blocking your view."

Or the GM says, " you're lawful good and have orders yo guard this location. You wouldn't wander off behind the tree. If you do, I'm changing your alignment and you'll lose your Paladin abilities."

If there are a couple ways to read a rule and one requires that you be a jerk and one doesn't, the one requiring you to be a jerk is wrong.

What a weirdly subjective maxim.

"I want to shieldbash with Shield Master before my attack action."

"Doesn't work that way."

"You're being a jerk, which means you've read the rule wrong, I shield bash!!!"

I have never argued that I have total control over the PCs actions.

Unless they're metagaming. You've declared that cheating, so metagame based actions are strcitly verboten