Bedrockgames
I post in the voice of Christopher Walken
No, I don't think you get it.
Be polite man
No, I don't think you get it.
Be polite man
I am noticing you're not getting what metagaming is. I am the soul of kindness, however, I feel you are trying to create a distraction.
So, we have Gm controlled Npcs that kidnap Gm contr. Npcs that force Pc* to search for a Gm cntr Npc** in order to invade a land of Gm cntr Npcs...
Man, if that's not railroad, I don't know what else could be.
Not player knowledge of Real World, we're debating, but P K of Game World, and the quoted part from RQ doesn't say anything on the latter.
It does speak of Pc boundaries, so everithing is still open to debate where this limit is, but the provided example warns only on OBVIOUS real world knowledge.
Perhaps I misremembered, but I thought you compared the troll bit to a unique monster and the players demanding to know about that, and that seems like an extreme example.
I think whether or not they find out through "reasonable" means is largely DM dependent, no?
Unless the players all get some kind of lore roll for every creature they encounter and then their knowledge is based on the results of the roll.
Is this what you do with your player backgrounds? The only example I recall that you've shared at this point is that one PC had a hermit friend who you might have show up one day. If you have others, it'd be cool if you share them. If I missed any, my apologies...it's a long thread and I haven't caught up on all new posts yet.
I think this is an extremely shallow reading of LotR. Aragorn's status as the rightful king is fundamental to his character from the moment he enters the story.
Assuming you use the standard D&D rules for starting money, aren't they exactly an example of this?
The bigger headache, no matter what the rules are, is if you're declaring you're a noble now that means you've in fact been a noble all along; which in turn means the question of your entourage (what it consists of, its general level of loyalty, its capabilities, and [most important to play!] whether any of it would have come with you into the field) should have been dealt with before you first entered play.
Where did this come from? I am assuming the GM - that is, I am assuming that it was not a player action declaration or an element of player-atuhored background that made the witch a focus of play.
I am also assuming that this came from the GM, in the sense that the leader, and the leader's connection to your family, were not things that resulted from player action declaration nor from an element of player-authored backgorund.
But am I right in taking it that the herbalist was a story element established by the GM, and made no particular reference to elements of PC backstory or PC goals?
Also, did the fact that your "great idea" presumalby had rather sorry implications for the herbalist (who, as you present it, seems to be harmless at worst, generous at best) come into play here?
This seems like a GM reveal/"gotcha". Was it pre-authored, or did the GM make this decision so as to negate your solution?
And what resulted from this? Were your family released? Did you homeland get destroyed?
The hard choice seems to be between two options both established by the GM - lose family or lose homeland. Is that correct?
Taking that context as given, the two things that I am curious about are the two moments of player choice: to summon the NPCs to attack an innocent herbalist and to stand with the NPCs at the end. I am very interested in the first in particular, as it seems to be harder choice - sacrificing an innocent person to save one's family.
My character knows trolls' weakness is fire. His uncle told him. Prove me wrong.It was absolutely not a railroad. A railroad is robbing the player of choice and forcing him down a narrow track. I had plenty of choices. I could save my family. I could save the people. I could have said screw it and gone to Waterdeep to become a sailor. I could have enlisted my companions to try and free my family, despite being told that would kill them. I could have retired and become a farmer. There was no railroad that I was forced down.
One example doesn't overcome that it very clearly said the players first duty was to play within the limits of the CHARACTER, not the player. It's talking about all player knowledge, not just real world or game knowledge, but just in case, I will point this out. The Monster Manual is in the real world, and it and everything in it is real world knowledge. We use that real world knowledge to play the game and construct the game world, but if real world knowledge isn't allowed into the game, the player cannot use any knowledge gained from the Monster Manual.
The irony is that the lesson "never give the players anything for free" was fully absorbed, but the actual context of skilled play dungeoneering was lost! There is no reason, from a standpoint of how a game should or must work for these things to exist anymore, unless you really do play very much like Dave did (and if so, that's great). But in terms of modern D&D play these restrictions are, well, highly restrictive! And they carry with them a sort of antagonistic play paradigm where a main part of the DM's job is to crack down on players, to make them toe some sort of line and not get out of hand. Its weird, and to be perfectly honest [MENTION=23751]Maxperson[/MENTION] a lot of your responses to [MENTION=42582]pemerton[/MENTION] kind of reek of it.