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

[Aldarc]

I guess my answer here in terms of the tea house and the sect is "OK, fine, its determined that the sect is NOT going to be found in the teahouse." Since the point of the game, IMHO is for interesting stuff to happen, then this particular teahouse, at least in the 'finding a sect' context is simply not going to even figure at all. So any decision I might make about it not having sect members, realistic or unrealistic, is going to have at most 2 seconds of table time, and probably none at all. I'm going to be going on to the place that DOES have the sect!

Well if we were going with emulating the genre of fiction, we could even employ the fairy tale Rule of 3 trope. The first two places you visit will not have what you seek, but the third time will be the charm.

 

[Imaculata]

I do both as well, though if I ask my players to roll, they don't want to see the dreaded 1 show up. I have a personal thing where I don't think a player rolling a 20 should result in something negative for them.

I am of the same mind. A 20 on a random encounter, means an exotic encounter in my campaigns. This can be good or bad, but it is usually something quite interesting.

 

[Maxperson]

I didn't say anything about NPCs - I talked about characters in fiction. In the context of RPGing, the PCs are the most salient such characters.

And whether or not my claim is a Red Herring, it doesn't rely on any False Dichotomy about realism. Which is what you asserted. I take it that you now retract that assertion.

It was also talking about the two extremes, rather than engaging the spectrum as it should with PCs, as well as NPCs. A statement can qualify multiple fallacies.

What system are you talking about? Maxperson's table's approach to D&D? Classic Traveller doesn't require time to be specified in such a way - I GMed a session on the weekend and as I went around the table to find out what the players were having their PCs do one said "I'm looking for a patron." Which takes a week.

Most, even the vast majority of them. Exceptions don't disprove the rule. Even with Traveller, it sounds like that time frame is built into the system, but as we did not specify the system, it wasn't specifically Traveller. Absent a specific system, you go with the common usage, which is what the majority of systems use.

In real life, if I tell someone that I'm going to a cafe and nothing more, I don't generate an implication that I won't be sitting there for a while. From that description of my action, who knows whether I'm going to the cafe for a minute (eg to pick up someone who is waiting for me there) or three hours or as long as I feel like?

I don't know about you, but when I tell my wife I'm going to the cafe, it's understood that it's a single instance of my going to the cafe. It's also understood that if I was going to go there day after day for months, I would mention that.

In a RPG, if a player says, speaking for his/her PC, I'm going to the teahouse to look for sect members , how long are they hanging out there? If the system doesn't specify in the way that Traveller does, and I as GM think it matters, then I ask. But it may not. I've played games where an appropriate response would be OK, you hang out at the teahouse for a little while with not much happening until a group of people enters looking rather furtive and obviously carrying knives under their shirts. How long is a little while? Ten minutes? Three hours? In many RPG systems it doesn't matter.

But again, this is just another Red Herring to distract from what I am saying, as well as a Strawman, since I did not say they would go to the tea house and leave the instant they show up. Going down to see if one is there involves more time than just popping your head in, but it does not involve multiple days or bribing the staff for months unless as you point out above, the PCs say so. In the example we are discussing, nobody said so, so it wasn't happening. Adding it later like you are doing is Moving the Goal Posts.

If per unit of play time, then that suggest my game is more exciting than yours (given that what we are talking about is the PCs encountering person Z who happens to be a dramatically interesting person in the context of the game).

The only thing it suggests is that you knock off more time for events than I do. It says nothing about which game is more or less exciting, and quite frankly a game which has unreasonably high chances of hitting long odds all the time would be boring is hell for me and my group. If you and your group find it to be more exciting than my style of play, great for you, but it does not suggest that in general your game is more exciting.

People would be more inclined to take what you say seriously if you weren't always putting other styles down with little smug comments like that all the time. Those comments detract from what you say and make people resistant to it.

 

[Maxperson]

I am of the same mind. A 20 on a random encounter, means an exotic encounter in my campaigns. This can be good or bad, but it is usually something quite interesting.

When I DM'd 3.5, I had a Fate Deck. It was composed of a few hundred Magic the Gathering cards. When a player rolled a 1 outside of initiative(unless it was an important initiative), they drew a card. That card would be applied to the situation as the hand of fate. For example, if a player was taking a swing at the enemy and rolled a 1, and drew say execute, they would either crit or kill outright the creature they were attacking, rather than auto missing. Which result would depend on how powerful the creature was. If they drew a shatter, their weapon would break if non-magical, or get an easy save to avoid breaking if it was magical. If they were trying to sunder or break something, the shatter would work in their favor and there would be no further rolling. The item in question would just break unless it was an artifact or something that can't break. At the beginning of the game I would draw 4 cards that the players could not see and keep them behind the screen, to use if a perfect moment arose, or if a card drawn for a 1 just didn't apply at all and one behind the screen did. The players loved it and the result was good or bad, and usually something interesting.

 

[Sadras]

To restate---in your view, "Say 'yes' or roll the dice" principles meaningfully diminish some combination of desirable gameplay qualities, including but not limited to:

Maintaining "The mystery of the unknown".
Maintaining "causational realism" or "causational coherence".
Ensuring the PCs don't inhabit an artificial "protagonist bubble" / keeping NPCs' within the same "realistic," "naturalistic," or "causational" boundaries as the PCs.

Can you elaborate how or why this diminishing effect happens?

I would be deeply suspicious of any GM who loudly and continually proclaimed how "realistic" and "causationally consistent" their games were, because it would tell me that at the end of the day, (s)he is willing to set the "purity of fiction" above the fun of the players.

I'm not sure if the below will satisfy your question.

* I was a player in a game with a riddle/mystery element to it.
* Stakes were high, the correct answer would return the character's spirit to his body. The PC was dead.
* The answer to the "riddle" was sealed in an envelope on the table at the start of the session.
* There were three possible answers.
* The PCs argued among themselves over which was the correct answer, as one could make a case for each. Nothing was certain.
* Through the adventure, it was revealed that the character did not want to return. Now this created a further conflict among the players. Did the PCs now answer correctly and go against the wishes of the spirit, OR did they answer incorrectly and have the spirit return (a) to his homeworld or (b) the FR Fugue Plane and perhaps suffer on the Wall of the Faithless (since he was not a native of Faerun).
A (b) result was definitely not wanted by any player.

Resolving this via Say yes or roll the dice would have diminished the mystery and fun of such a game. The DM was indeed the player of the PC and we agreed he would DM that once-off session while I, the campaign DM, would play an NPC. I was just as clueless to the answers as the rest of the players.

 

[Numidius]

I'm not sure if the below will satisfy your question.

* I was a player in a game with a riddle/mystery element to it.
* Stakes were high, the correct answer would return the character's spirit to his body. The PC was dead.
* The answer to the "riddle" was sealed in an envelope on the table at the start of the session.
* There were three possible answers.
* The PCs argued among themselves over which was the correct answer, as one could make a case for each. Nothing was certain.
* Through the adventure, it was revealed that the character did not want to return. Now this created a further conflict among the players. Did the PC now answer correctly and go against the wishes of the spirit, OR did they answer incorrectly and have the spirit return (a) to his homeworld or (b) the FR Fugue Plane and perhaps suffer on the Wall of the Faithless.
A (b) result was definitely not wanted by any player.

Resolving this via Say yes or roll the dice would have diminished the mystery and fun of such a game. The DM was indeed the player of the PC and we agreed he would DM that once-off session while I, the campaign DM, would play an NPC. I was just as clueless to the answers as the rest of the players.

Hi Sadras. I don't get how would you resolve that situation with Say yes or roll the dice.
Say yes to what? Roll the dice for what?

 

[Sadras]

Hi Sadras. I don't get how would you resolve that situation with Say yes or roll the dice.
Say yes to what? Roll the dice for what?

I admit this may be a terrible example.
My line of thought was a No (incorrect answer to the riddle) which my play example offered does not diminish the fun and maintains purity of the fiction.

EDIT: The PCs wishing to go to the teahouse and find x is like selecting an answer to the riddle where a No result can be a distinct possibility.

 

[Numidius]

I admit this may be a terrible example.
My line of thought was a No (incorrect answer to the riddle) which my play example offered does not diminish the fun and maintains purity of the fiction.

EDIT: The PCs wishing to go to the teahouse and find x is like selecting an answer to the riddle where a No result can be a distinct possibility.

Terrible indeed! No, I'm joking, and excuse me if I'm being pedantic:
"Say yes or roll" is assuming a game or situation without GM Veto, Necessary Prerequisites for pass/fail and the like.
It is meant also for conflict resolution in mind, but can be easily ported to task res.
Anyway, in a d&d situation it would be like: We don't wake up the dragon and steal the treasure!
Gm: Dude... Roll for initiative and prepare for combat.

Or: We use scouts and animals to open a way thru the jungle and arrive at the temple's gate.
Gm: Fine. / Not so fast: roll for every task you do, the forest is full of dangers.

In your example it'd be something like:
We don't solve the riddle and instead use a magic ritual/thief skill to overcome it.
Gm: roll your dice and let's see...

Generally speaking SYORTD was intended for games in which the "information" is not only easily obtained by PCs, but rather given in advance by the Gm to favor choices, course of action, conflicting inter-party decisions to be made, by the table.

You can also use it like :
I use streetwise to track down the sect when they go to a tea house.
Gm: fine. They go around openly, you spot them easily.
Or: Gm: they have spies around downtown that might spot you first: roll... (then anything might happen)

 

[Satyrn]

Aha, no more can you hide from us Harvey Satyrn Dent!

It's a . . . *flips coin* . . . fair cop.

 

[Numidius]

Terrible indeed! No, I'm joking, and excuse me if I'm being pedantic:
"Say yes or roll" is assuming a game or situation without GM Veto, Necessary Prerequisites for pass/fail and the like.
It is meant also for conflict resolution in mind, but can be easily ported to task res.
Anyway, in a d&d situation it would be like: We don't wake up the dragon and steal the treasure!
Gm: Dude... Roll for initiative and prepare for combat.

Or: We use scouts and animals to open a way thru the jungle and arrive at the temple's gate.
Gm: Fine. / Not so fast: roll for every task you do, the forest is full of dangers.

In your example it'd be something like:
We don't solve the riddle and instead use a magic ritual/thief skill to overcome it.
Gm: roll your dice and let's see...

Generally speaking SYORTD was intended for games in which the "information" is not only easily obtained by PCs, but rather given in advance by the Gm to favor choices, course of action, conflicting inter-party decisions to be made, by the table.

You can also use it like :
I use streetwise to track down the sect when they go to a tea house.
Gm: fine. They go around openly, you spot them easily.
Or: Gm: they have spies around downtown that might spot you first: roll... (then anything might happen)

As an aside: in games like Dungeon World and Traveller* (also maybe 4e?) there is no room for SYORTD, because their prescriptive rules cannot be ignored and already provide a range of different outcomes that change the ongoing fiction which again cannot be ignored (in a sense, these games might have already bolted-in the level of realism they want to provide)

On the other hand, old D&D was basically all Say Yes Or Roll: the dice to roll were those of Combat, in case the DM wasn't convinced of the players' alternative plans to it. (Here, your mileage may vary about realism)

Makes sense? (Real question)



*@pemerton, correct me if I'm wrong about Traveller and 4e