I'd say it would depend on how the players approach it all as PCs. If they skip the town and head straight to the Caves then yeah, they're on their own and metagaming might become a problem.
However, I'd say they should have to interact with the town NPCs again, but that the interaction will take a different turn very quickly when an NPC says: "You're the second bunch of people been through here in just a few weeks intending to head out that way. No idea what became of the first lot; nobody's seen 'em since they left." It's on the DM to make sure this happens sooner rather than later.
That alone should inform the new PCs that a) there's other adventurers out there, be they alive or dead, and b) that they haven't returned red-flags the danger level, and c) that if the PCs don't already have a Ranger in the group they might want to recruit one to track the first adventuring group and see where it went.
And voila: metagaming issues largely headed off at the pass.
I've just above provided a fast-track means of achieving this end which is also perfectly plausible in the fiction.
What Aldarc said! In the scenario desdribed the players are using out-of-game knowledge (eg their knowledge that this is the second set of PCs to tackle the Caves) and are declaring actions based on that (eg trying to trigger certain GM-narration-via-NPCs).I'm not so sure. All you are doing is creating a post hoc in-game justification for the metagaming (with big spoonful of self-delusion) rather than actually stopping the metagaming.
Wouldn't it just be quicker if the GM told the players As you travel to the Caves, you past peasant and tinkers travelling two and from the Keep. They all shake their heads when they see you, muttering about a similar group who headed off a fortnight earlier and never returned.
Or if the table cares about this sort of thing, the players could make something up.
D&D has its origins in wargaming.Not every example of metagaming is bad.
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Perhaps in the context of D&D only you may claim that, but even then, it's just your opinion. I am very comfortable with certain types of metagaming in D&D.
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I think there are degrees that are allowed.
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So really, the question is "how much is allowed?" rather than "is any allowed?"
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There are plenty of ways to allow metagaming that are acceptable and which can enhance the game rather than take away from it.
When I replay a waragme, I'm expected to use the skill and information I acquired the first time I played it. That's how I get better.
When D&D was invented, players were expected to use the skill and information they acquired the first time the played. That was how players got better. That's part of what Gygax had in mind when he advocated "skilled play".
This is why early D&D is characterised by so much new content introduction (new monsters, new traps, etc), and sharing of these items among referees. Referees needed a constant supply of new puzzles to keep challenging their players.
(And the idea that this has anything in common with cheating at a module is ludicrous. The only person who has trouble distinguishing the two cases is [MENTION=23751]Maxperson[/MENTION].)
The idea that a player who has skill would, in the course of playing the game, pretend not to have it, is one that post-dates the origins of D&D. It's certainly not the only way to play D&D, and frankly to me it seems rather degeneate - no one in this thread has even explained how it would work.
If you house rule the bolded portion in, sure. The skill itself is intended to be used to determine PC knowledge when there is no in game reason for the PC to know the informationpemerton said:If the PC already has the knowledge because, for instance, the player has the knowledge and is acting on it, then obviously no check is required and the monster knowledge check rules do not apply.
The two of you are just making this up. I"ve quoted the rule. The rule says nothing about when a check is or isn't required: it explains how to adjudicate a check if one is made. Obviously if a player already knows, s/he won't seek to make the check; and there is nothing in the rule that suggests the GM is to use checks to gate players' use of their knowledge.They are also devices for telling a knowledgeable player playing an ignorant character when the player knowledge may be used (success on the skill check) and when it may not (failure on said check).
I don't know what the 5e rule for this stuff is, but frrankly it's laughable that you're trying to school me on 4e!
And now you're trying to school me on logic and the English language?If you have to rationalize the knowledge, you've failed. There should be an appropriate reason for it.
"ra·tion·al·ize
verb
1.
attempt to explain or justify (one's own or another's behavior or attitude) with logical, plausible reasons, even if these are not true or appropriate."
Rationalise means to explain/justify with reasons. Even if those reason are not true. But also if those reasons are true but (eg) not self-evident.
In other words, even if isn't a synonym for when.
This is incoherent. If you've deciding that your PC doesn't know about trolls, although you already do know about trolls, you're not discovering anything. Deciding isn't discoverying.When I already know something as a player, but my character doesn't, I am indeed discovering what he knows via those activities I described. For me discovery is happening. For you, not so much.
How does this even work? Do you just let your PC be killed by the trolls?if my PC doesn't know about troll weaknesses, it's good roleplaying to portray that in character.
This doesn't answer [MENTION=6972053]Numidius[/MENTION]'s question: what do you expect good play to look like in this sort of case.I wouldn't do anything at that moment. If the player metagames, that would be cheating, even if it saves the party. A win via cheating cheapens the game for all of my players as we are on the same page with regards to metagaming, so the player would be spoken to afterwards and given a first and final about cheating. What I wouldn't do is stop the declared action. It's not my job to to control the PCs.